


After Time Adrift Among the Stars

by NoisyNoiverns, xMidnightSun



Series: Rise & Reign [1]
Category: Mass Effect
Genre: Gen, Origin Story, Original Character-centric, pre-me1
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-20
Updated: 2014-11-12
Packaged: 2018-01-20 04:34:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 16
Words: 96,365
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1496836
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NoisyNoiverns/pseuds/NoisyNoiverns, https://archiveofourown.org/users/xMidnightSun/pseuds/xMidnightSun
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Axilus Madelivio is a turian marine on the last training mission of his military career. Thie'Haasn nar Olyna is a young quarian pilgrim freshly embarked on a quest to adulthood. One encounter with a company of slavers later, and their lives are changed forever.</p><p>Concurrent with the events of Mass Effect: Revelation.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. You Can Prepare For Everything, but You're Never Prepared Enough

Everything had gone wrong, Axilus thought to himself as another shot hissed by the crate he'd repurposed for cover, mere inches from his twitching hand. His shotgun lay just out of reach, his pistol's heat sinks overloaded far beyond return and his assault rifle so damaged as to have become useless even as a club, let alone a firearm. Without even the most primitive weapon, unless he desired to have his arm blasted off as he reached in vain for his ever-so-tempting last functioning firearm, without field experience, and without a team-- his team was gone; dead, captured, he didn't know, he only knew they wouldn't be able to help him now, and that positively terrified him-- he had no chance of making it out of this confrontation alive.

He was a trainee. A rookie, only old enough to join the turian military in his father's footsteps little more than a year ago, and he was still deep in training. His team, a group of ten other trainees, was strong, but inexperienced, and their commanding lieutenant's higher-ups had instructed her to take them on one more training mission, a simple one. So they'd been sent on a routine raiding run of a well-known slaver's ship, tasked with rescuing a group of turian hostages they'd taken in the wake of yet another colony assault. They weren't too intelligent, they weren't overly powerful. A perfect match for a rookie squadron's last training mission. They had been told it would be easy, an in-and-out in an hour or less. Everyone was supposed to make it out alive and well. All eleven rookies, plus their lieutenant and the six turian hostages they had been sent to liberate. Everyone was supposed to survive, come home more experienced and six men stronger. But now...

He swallowed hard, looking across the cluttered room to the three bodies lying motionless in a pool of dark, half-congealed navy blue. Friends of his. Strangers at one time, long ago, but now the closest thing he had to friends. Three of them cold and lifeless. Two still unaccounted for save a smear of blood and a pair of long-forgotten pistols, likely fallen elsewhere beneath the hail of fire. He couldn't bear to look, and even if he'd had the courage, he doubted the slavers firing incessantly upon him would have spared him a chance to count their casualties. They wanted to kill them all, and they had taken all the right steps to do so.

They hadn't stood a chance; the batarians had somehow known they were coming, they had lain a trap, and they had executed it perfectly. Lack of power meant nothing when you had the element of surprise, and especially the advantage in numbers. Even his talented trainer, the decorated Lieutenant Commander Caheen Nieght, with all her skills and tactics-- even she couldn't have made it through the hail of bullets and grenades that had filled the room the second they'd entered, not considering the rate at which everyone else had gone down. It chilled him to think that his commander, intimidating and experienced as she was, likely lay lifeless somewhere beyond the view of the crate he'd commandeered as his sole remaining hope of survival, likely as the sole remaining member of his squadron. The ambush had gone off without a hitch, and now, everyone he knew, everyone he'd trained with and worked side-by-side with for more than a year now, they were all either dead, missing, or worse.

And he would be too, if he didn't move soon. The batarians wouldn't let him live when they got through his hastily-built barricade if they had their way. You couldn't expect mercy from a company of men who made their living by kidnapping colonists off their frontier homeworlds and spiriting them away to auction off as slaves. Even the men they'd spared from the last doomed expedition had been on the list, and that was why they'd been sent to liberate them.

How ironic, he bitterly thought, that their rescue mission would end up needing rescue itself.

When a break in the fire spilled silence through the room, Axilus took the chance to peer from behind his shield and survey the enemy. Five batarians, one sporting but a stump from the right elbow down; he'd shot the hard locks on the doors when the ambush had first broken out, and one of their enemies had been unlucky enough to be halfway in the doorway when it had slammed shut. Even now, a smear of dark, dried blood stained the door's seam, and a pale appendage still jutted out perpendicular to the wall, a pistol clenched in its cold, stiff fingers. The only casualty the enemy had suffered. They'd only managed to wound one of them, and only by pure luck, yet they'd lost at least three if not more in the assault. And if he didn't move fast, that number was going to rise once more.

He took a deep, steadying breath, bracing himself against the ship's bulkhead as he waited for the hail to cease again, for the gunmen to stop and vent their heat sinks. They were using assault weapons; they couldn't last much longer, not with how quickly their sinks filled. He just had to wait for the right time.

Eventually an eerie silence fell as the moment he'd been waiting for came, filled only with the hissing of venting heat sinks and the drumbeat of his heart hammering against his ribs, and, knowing he had no other choice but death, he bolted.

One lucky shot struck him in the leg, staggering him, though his kinetic barriers took most of the impact. Instead of tearing his leg open, the force of the blow merely rendered his leg numb, and he fought to compensate as the right side of his body suddenly fell behind the left. Another bullet grazed one mandible, embedding in his armor's collar. Flecks of molten ceramic peppered his unprotected neck, though the pain, and luckily the damage, was negligible. A third clipped his injured leg again, enough to knock him off balance, and, cursing in every dialect he knew, he fell, grasping in vain for the wall he'd hoped to slide behind.

A familiar tri-fingered hand wrapped around his wrist, and before he knew quite what was happening, he was dragged out of his assailants's line of sight, and his rescuer immediately began to return fire with what looked like a stolen, battered batarian assault rifle, its dull gray paneling streaked with something he vaguely recognized from the training vids as alien blood. Batarian blood, the little logical voice in the back of his mind whispered through the throbbing fog of pain, though he ignored what it had said. He was too stunned, staring wide-eyed at the tall, lean figure with the rifle braced against his shoulder, firing like he'd been shooting a gun all his life. The figure looked shockingly familiar, though his frazzled mind was having too much trouble trying to work through the fog of pain to piece together their identity. Then his suit hissed softly, the emergency systems kicking into gear, and medi-gel flooded his wounds, and the sudden absence of pain flooded his brain with clarity and he found himself shocked by surprise yet again.

"Move!" Viridus (could it be Viridus? He'd sworn Viridus had lain among the casualties... was his mind playing tricks?) hissed, nudging him with his foot once he'd ducked back down from his suppressive fire. His voice sounded tight, and he could tell from the way his mandibles were stiffly pressed against his cheeks that he'd been badly injured, which was confirmed after a quick glance-over revealed a gaping hole in his armor where a barrage of bullets had melted the high-durability ceramic to the light plates underneath. Blue trickled slowly from between a cracked seal and the solid skin of his armor, though the flow was nowhere near as strong as it should be for a wound as bad as he'd had to have sustained from such an attack. Medi-gel was a miracle, for sure. "We gotta get out of here!"

"Viridus?" Axilus stared at the other turian with wide eyes. His military brain had caught up with the situation, but the rest of his head was somewhere far behind, lost in shock. "You're alive?"

Viridus parted his mandibles in a forced, awkward smile that didn't reach his eyes. "Barely made it. Just caught a bullet or two in the side, nothing bad. Thank the spirits for kinetic barriers. Haldrus wasn't so lucky. Caught by surprise, shields down. Not looking good." Viridus gestured over Axilus's shoulder with a grim frown.

With a sinking feeling growing in his chest, Axilus turned to look, and he immediately wished he hadn't.

Sitting in a slowly growing pool of blood, Haldrus was slumped against a crate, breathing ragged and eyes half-lidded. One hand lay limply over dozens of gaping, sluggishly-bleeding wounds peppering most of his abdomen, the other pressed against a deep, dark blue gash in his face. His thin armor was far beyond destroyed, his eyes were dull, unfocused, and there was an unsettling rattle to his labored breaths. Axilus was shocked to see the once-prideful turian at his most vulnerable like this.

Haldrus had been from a proud family, though now, it was looking as though he'd never be able to see them again. His father was an officer so highly-ranked, Haldrus refused to say just how close he was to becoming Primarch. His mother was a skilled Spec Ops commando with a successful mission ratio beyond that which he'd ever seen before, at least among anyone but the Cabals. Haldrus wasn't nearly as naturally gifted as them, he admitted it himself (and liked to make light of it with jokes in a manner Axilus had never seen before in the son of such a prestigious family), though compared to someone like himself, he was still greatly talented. Seeing him as injured and dazed by blood loss as he was now was a little more than humbling.

Axilus was shocked he was even still alive, with such serious wounds; Viridus had to have acted fast to save him from death. And if they didn't move quickly, it would all be in vain anyway.

Viridus coughed, and Haldrus jolted, eyes flicking up from the bulkhead they'd been locked on to meet Axilus's, though only for a second, and he struggled to wave a hand, mumbling, "Hey."

"Hey," Axilus managed to respond, unable to look away until Viridus spun him around by the shoulder. With a soft yelp, he huffed and opened his mouth to speak up in indignation, but the other turian cut him off.

"Where's Dantae, Maena, and Tsiene?" Viridus demanded. He looked desperate, and Axilus vaguely recalled rumors and hushed whispers about his not-so-secret infatuation with Tsiene. Not a surprise; several of the new recruits and rookies had a thing for her. She was a powerful woman, even for a rookie, and everyone knew that she and Szarus, of all their class, were the most likely of them all to make it big in the military. It was just a given; they were skilled, dedicated, everything a soldier needed to be. And that made what he had to say even harder.

Axilus dropped his gaze to the ground, fiddling with a smear of dark blue on the cold metal floor. One of the bullets had penetrated his armor, he noticed, and he was starting to bleed through his armor's perforations. Setting his armor to release a steady trickle of medi-gel to combat the damage, he finally met Viridus's gaze again, and he could see in his eyes that he already knew. "She... they didn't make it," he finally said. "Maena and Dantae got caught by a grenade. Not much left of him, she's only recognizable by her paint. And Tsiene..." He swallowed. "... one of them emptied a clip from their assault rifle into her. Bled out real slow. I wanted to help, but..."

Unbidden, the image of the three cold, dead bodies lying in pools of clotted ocean blue flashed into his mind, and Axilus felt himself shudder. He'd been close to all of them, Dantae in particular. Dantae, he'd grown up with as childhood neighbors. Maena and Tsiene he hadn't met until he'd joined the military and been shipped off to training, but they'd become fast friends in the time he'd known them. All of them had been impossibly talented, incredibly intelligent, the best sort of friends he'd ever managed to make. Even his older brother, Tollak, as prickly and unsatisfied with the state of everything as he was, approved of them, and that was really saying something about their quality as people.

He wasn't sure what loss hurt the most; the loss of his closest friends was painful, yes, impossibly so, but he couldn't quite work out whether the aching in his chest was as a result of that or as a result of something else, something more. The realization that they weren't as invincible as they'd been taught to be, perhaps, or maybe the deep-seated, newfound dread of what was to come if this was a sign of his military career's direction. He'd been planning to go as far with the military as his father, hopefully becoming an officer later on in life, but now he wasn't even sure if he wanted to finish training. Not that he had a choice, though. None of them did.

A soft whimper brought Axilus out of his daze, and he watched as Viridus's hand dropped to his side and the other turian just stared off into space, eyes wide and mandibles pressed tight to his cheeks. "She's..." His voice cracked, subvocals betraying his distress, and he ducked his head. "... I... I see. That's... too bad. I guess we have to move on anyway."

"Viridus-"

"People die," he snapped, looking up suddenly with fire in his eyes. Instead of mourning, Viridus was vengeful. He wanted revenge on those who had killed his object of affection instead of escape, and that was a dangerous choice. "People die, and we can't stop that. But we can damn well make sure the men responsible pay." He was on his feet in an instant, leaning out of cover to check the slavers's position. Then he ducked back behind and nodded towards Haldrus, pointedly avoiding meeting Axilus's eyes. "Help him up. He's probably going to need help getting around."

"Wait, what? The hell are you talking about?"

"We're moving. Don't stand a chance if we stay here, especially on our own. Got to find the LT and anyone else still alive," Viridus curtly responded, finally meeting Axilus's eyes. He'd never been much of a leader before, but then, he'd never had something to fight for, not really. Now that the girl he'd been sweet on for a year now, or maybe more, was gone, brutally slaughtered by slavers, he had a purpose in life, at least to himself. It made sense. Or, perhaps "made sense" was too strong. He still hadn't quite wrapped his head around the tragedy himself; he'd been anticipating confusion, depression, not rage.

"What makes you think anyone's even still alive?" he challenged, and he saw Viridus tense. "They took out three of us, almost four," he gestured in Haldrus's direction, "with just four or five of them, what makes you think the others fared any better? Maybe they're all dead. What then?"

"They're not dead."

"How do you know?"

"They have Lieutenant Commander Caheen Nieght with them," Viridus hissed, sounding for all the world like the answer ought to be so obvious. "She won't let them die. She'd kill them all first. You know she would."

He was quiet for a moment. Then he stooped and reached for Haldrus's arm, and he heard Viridus snort and start rechecking his weapon. "C'mon, can you stand? There you go, nice and slow..."

Haldrus stood with a grunt, grimacing and pressing his hand against his mutilated abdomen as if the weak pressure would stop his blood from pouring out the way it was. Another application of medi-gel later, and he was standing on his own, if a bit unbalanced. He still looked terrible, but Axilus was a little more confident about his odds now. "Maybe I should... stay behind..."

"No." Viridus sounded offended by the suggestion, eyes narrowing as he turned back and glared at the other two rookies standing behind him. When he decided to take charge, he wanted to stay in charge, evidently, and anyone not going exactly along with his orders he took personally. "No one else is getting left behind. You're getting out of this, Haldrus, if I have to carry you back to the ship myself. Got it?"

Haldrus paused, his mandibles fluttering in an expression he couldn't quite recognize. He was silent for a long minute, so long that Axilus was afraid for a second he would keel over before he could respond. Then he slowly nodded. "I think... I'm gonna need more... more medi-gel, then..."

Both turians relaxed. Axilus exhaled slowly, taking a moment to collect himself before moving to Haldrus's side again. "Hold still, it's going to sting..." he mumbled as he applied another thin coat of the miracle salve to his wounds. Haldrus didn't even flinch, just swayed ominously, and that was worrisome, but he didn't say anything. Viridus had enough on his mind right now, he could tell that much. And besides, he was sure he could take care of Haldrus just fine. How bad could he really be hurt?

"Is he mobile?"

"Barely, but yeah."

Viridus slung his pilfered assault rifle across his back, nodding towards a nearby door. Axilus knew it led nowhere useful, but maybe that was the way the others had gotten out of the room before they were all shot down. They could rendezvous and figure out a plan of attack, or at least retreat if they'd lost too many to continue. "That way. I picked up a signal from somewhere down that side of the ship; we're going to try to intercept it before whoever it is gets too far away to help us." He shifted slightly, suddenly looking very serious. "Don't make a sound. If the slavers figure out we're retreating, they'll follow us, and we won't stand a chance."

"Right." Suddenly, he realized a critical fact they'd both overlooked and cursed under his breath. "Haldrus is bleeding. They can follow the blood trail right to us, and to whoever we might find. What do we do about that?"

Viridus hesitated, then responded briskly, "More medi-gel."

"But an overdose could knock him out cold, and we don't have a medic anymore. Not since Maena..."

Maena had been the team's field medic, if you could reduce her position to that after how effective she had been. Several had joked about her being a portable medbay, or the will of the spirits incarnate. Abnormally tall for a turian, with a fluidity rarely seen in soldiers, especially turian ones, she had easily built a sturdy base for her career in just the first year of training, which positively blew her superiors away. Some claimed the officers were almost too generous with her rewards, and more than a few were highly suspicious of her. But nobody could deny her skill, try as they might. The way she fluttered across the battlefield, the simple grace with which she saved life after life, calm as ever beneath the storm of battle, and her pale complexion had earned her the nickname "Angel" among her fellow rookies in mere weeks, and she certainly lived up to the great expectations lain before her, demanding respect from even the most intense officers. Until today, at least.

Viridus's jaw tightened, and Axilus realized too late that mentioning her was very much a bad idea. Too late now to take it back. "He'll be fine. I can take care of him if he passes out. We've got to move."

"Are you sure?"

The other turian met his eyes with a scalding glare, firmly nodding and briskly replying, "I'm sure." Then he turned away, hefting his stolen rifle in one hand and using the other to close its vented heat sink. "Come on. Make sure Haldrus keeps up. We need to get him to the LT."

Axilus glanced back at their injured comrade, who had by then managed to shake off most of the medi-gel's fog and was standing more or less at attention behind them. Then he sighed and turned back to their self-proclaimed leader. "What's the plan?"

"I have some smoke grenades," Viridus began, tossing one of said hand grenades up in the air and catching it without looking. "We smoke the room, obscure their line of sight. Soon's the smoke's thick enough, head for that door," he pointed to the door in question, the one that only led deeper into the unknown, "and get down the hallway and around the nearest corner. Then we follow radio pings to the source. Either we find allies there, or..." He glanced back to the other two, expression tight. "Or, this is our last mission together, and we either die or get sold off as slaves, good as dead. We have no other choice."

For a long moment, no one spoke. Then Haldrus coughed and the other two started, and he quietly added, "They've stopped firing."

Axilus paused. Then he nodded sharply, pushing past Viridus to peer out of cover at the batarians. "They're venting. We have to do it now!"

Before the last word even formed in his mouth, there was a short, blinding flash and a loud hissing sound, and the room filled with thick gray smoke. He heard the batarians yell something, felt something whiz inches from his face as one of them started to fire their overheated weapon into the fog, but he kept running.  
Everyone was through the door and gone by the time the smoke cleared.

Haldrus skidded to a stop behind the other two the moment they made it through the door, staggering back to the door's control panel and prying it open with a grunt. His omnitool blazed to life, its vibrant orange cutting a piercing beam through the dissipating smoke, and seconds later, the door slammed shut so hard the floor beneath their feet rattled. Then the injured turian stumbled back, tripping over his own feet in the process and crashing to the ground with a cry so pathetic, it couldn't possibly have come from a turian.

His heart dropped from his chest. "Haldrus!" Axilus lunged for his teammate the same moment as Viridus, and he slammed hard into his side and clumsily crashed to the ground with a yelp. Viridus, unscathed, kept his balance and dashed to Haldrus's side, immediately helping him sit up.

"Are you all right? Do you need more medi-gel?" Viridus sounded panicked, and for good reason. If Haldrus died, he'd be the fourth that they knew of that had died on what was supposed to be nothing more than a training mission. "Spirits, he's bleeding everywhere...! Madelivio, help me!" He turned, eyes wild, one blue-stained hand reaching for him in desparation.

"Viri, forget it..." A shaking hand gently pushed Viridus's arm to his side, and he turned back, wide gold eyes meeting half-lidded green. "I'm not gonna... I'm not gonna make it."

"Like hell you aren't!" Viridus spat, subvocals rising in panic. "Come on, we can get you to Lieutenant Nieght, we can- we can help-"

"No, we can't," Haldrus interrupted, his voice firm, and Viridus fell silent, a protest dying on his tongue. "I can't do it, Vir. I can't do it."

"But-"

"Don't die here because of-" He broke off, coughing hard, and for a moment, Axilus, still shocked into silence and stillness, was afraid he wouldn't recover. But he did, his breath now a ragged pant. "Be- because of- of me, Vir..." He swallowed hard, mandibles fluttering even as he tried to cover up his pain, and when he spoke again, his voice was much more even, controlled, though his breathing still stuttered. "Don't die here. Neither of- of you."

"Viridus, I-"

"You heard me." He fixed them both with a stony stare, then coughed again, harder, and Axilus was alarmed to notice dots of blue staining what remained of his teal arm plating as he leaned back, panting again. Haldrus's eyelids drooped, and his head sagged as he mumbled, "I'm tired," under his breath between pants.

"Damn it!" Viridus nearly leaped to his feet, seizing Haldrus by the arm and dragging him up as well, looping his arm around his neck. "Madelivio, take his other side! We are getting him to Lieutenant Nieght if it kills us both."

Axilus didn't argue, just moved to Haldrus's other side and slung his arm around his neck, wrapping an arm carefully around the other turian's mutilated midsection to keep him upright. When Viridus began moving, limping along at a quick walking pace, Axilus followed, the both of them struggling to keep Haldrus upright between them. The injured turian's head lolled, his mandibles fluttering weakly every now and then in protest when they jarred his wounds, and his eyes began to close, staring off at nothing on the walls. He noted with a sinking feeling that the blood flow had slowed again, though neither of them had given him medi-gel, and quickened his pace.

It took a long while of limping along at a respectable pace for them to get anywhere, and Viridus constantly had to slide to a stop and alter their course as the signal pings changed direction, which was never any good on Haldrus. The injured turian was beginning to look less like a soldier and more like a corpse as the minutes ticked by, the splatters of blood trailing them growing smaller and more sparse at an alarming rate. His breathing had slowed, his body had gone limp, and both rookies knew he was mere inches from death. Axilus was beginning to lose hope that they'd ever find the others, and he could tell from the limpness of his mandibles that Viridus was too.

Then they barged through a door and found themselves face-to-face with a turian-issue rifle, and before either of them had processed what was happening, Lieutenant Commander Caheen Nieght had torn Haldrus from them with an explicit exclamation. "Spirits! Freiya, Demienn, get medi-gel on these two, stat!"

The two of them managed to exchange a confused look before understanding blossomed behind each of their eyes. Viridus went slack with relief, nearly collapsing into Freiya's arms. Axilus simply fell to his knees, staring at nothing in shock.

Somehow, they had finally made it.

* * *

 

By the time Axilus had recovered from the shock, Vreena and Demienn had already carried Haldrus away and were busily tending to him in the corner with Lieutenant Nieght, and Freiya sat quietly at his side, a half-empty canister of medi-gel clutched in her talons. When she noticed he'd finally awakened, her expression transformed from blank to joyful.

"Thank the spirits you're alive!" She slung her arms around his shoulders, holding him tight and pressing her forehead affectionately against his. He was stunned, but reciprocated after a moment, though he winced when he tried to embrace her back and found his arm tightly bandaged. He hadn't even noticed he'd been wounded. Too busy surviving, he surmised.

"Freiya. It's so good to see you again." He couldn't hide the relief in his subvocals, not that he wanted to anyway. Freiya was one of his last friends from childhood, especially now that Dantae was gone (a cold shiver ran down his spine at the memory of his body lying in a pool of azure), and his oldest friend to date. They'd literally grown up together, close enough to be mistaken for siblings despite their distinct coloration difference. They'd joined the military together and had rejoiced when they were assigned to the same training squadron, and he realized that he couldn't imagine the stress she'd been through while they'd been separated while he'd hardly thought about her at all. "I thought you were dead."

"We got through the door when the ambush began," she explained, finally sitting back on her heels with a positively glowing smile, "and I thought you and the other five were right behind us, but when I tried to find you, you weren't there. Demienn was so worried about his brother; did he make it?"

He looked down. Demienn and Dantae were twins, he remembered. They'd never been separated before a day in their lives before their military training had begun. Now he didn't know how he was going to explain that Demienn's other half was lying somewhere else in the ship, breathing through a dozen new holes in his chest. He fought to think of the words, but for all his life he couldn't think of a way to say it.

In the end, he didn't have to explain. Freiya was good at reading his expressions, and she understood without his ever saying a thing precisely what had happened. Her face fell, though she tried to keep her tone upbeat. "Oh. Well, I'm... I'm sure Demienn will be glad to know he went down fighting." She was trying to preserve his feelings, likely trying to keep him from feeling guilty. Didn't work, but he was grateful she was trying, at least. "Don't feel guilty or anything. I'm sure you did everything you could."

"I tried." His voice sounded hoarse now, his subvocals falling to a range even a human would be able to identify as distressed. "I tried, Freiya, I really tried. But the battle was just so..."

"Chaotic. Unexpected," a voice interrupted, and both turians jumped. Over Axilus's right shoulder, Lieutenant Nieght stared at them with her arms crossed, mandibles tight against her cheeks, eyes narrowed nearly to slits. "Of course it was. That's why you six didn't get to the door in time. Didn't hear my commands."

He stuttered, trying to think of a way to apologize. "Ma'am, I- I didn't even- We didn't- I'm sorry-"

"Don't be." Her expression softened and her posture relaxed, if only a little. She looked from him to Freiya and nodded towards Haldrus, and without a word exchanged between them, Freiya stood and retreated. "I don't blame any of you for not getting to the door in time. It was chaotic out there. I'm just glad any of you made it out alive."

Startled by the sudden change in her tone, he took a deep breath to relax himself and shifted to give her room as she knelt beside him where Freiya had been.

Slowly, with a gentleness as if he would break should she move too quickly, she took his injured arm in hand and carefully unwrapped the bandages from it to examine the wound. "You got lucky, Madelivio. They barely touched you and Caestero," she jerked her chin in the direction of where Viridus sat slouched against a wall, Demienn practically glued to his side. "I expected worse."

"What about Haldrus?" he asked, quietly, already afraid of the answer. "Is he going to...?"

She was quiet for a moment, exchanging his soiled bandages for fresh, and she didn't look up at him until after she'd tied them off again. "He isn't going to make it," she stated simply.

His blood ran cold.

She continued, "We simply don't have the medical technology to tend to his injuries. There's too much damage. Even if we could make it back to the ship, even in five or ten minutes, I don't think he'd survive long enough to get him proper attention." Her voice was calm and even, but her hands had begun shaking, mandibles quivering in barely-contained rage. If he remembered right, she'd lost her entire team once on a suicide mission, the only one to walk away with the physical and emotional capability to continue service. Losing so many on something as little as a training mission had to be either heartbreaking or positively enraging. "I don't like it any more than you do, but that's life, and that's military. People die, and there's nothing we can do about it."

"Ma'am..."

"Are you mobile, Madelivio?" she interrupted, moving to stand.

"I- yes, ma'am, but-"

"Good." Her expression was controlled once more, the shaking nothing more than an occasional tremor in the tips of her talons. She almost looked disconnected from the situation, and he found himself wondering if that was how she withstood all the stress of the military life. "We managed to raid a small armory and procure some weapons while you were out of commission. Stop by Aelianus and she'll suit you up." She folded her arms behind her back. "Gather in ten."

His mouth opened and closed, mandibles fluttering wildly as he struggled to think of something to say. Then he gave up and straightened up as much as he could while seated, saluting. "Ma'am, yes, ma'am."


	2. There's Always a Light Amidst the Dark If You Look Hard Enough

"Wait." Viridus put a hand up, and everyone halted behind him. "Batarians," he whispered, raising his rifle and bracing it against his shoulder. "Four of them. Lightly armed."

They were joking around with each other, laughing. Unaware of the seven turians crouched outside the door, two peering inside with weapons at the ready. It was their off-time, and they were off the guard, unaware.

Lucky for us, Axilus thought to himself.

He moved up to Viridus's side, squaring the bulbous head of one of the unaware slavers in his sights. Beside him, Szarus and Vreena did the same. Silently, they counted off to three, and then simultaneously pulled the trigger. Three bodies silently crashed to the ground. One slumped over the table in front of him, slowly sliding to the floor as gravity took hold. They waited a breath, two, three, but no alarm went off.

"Move." Lieutenant Commander Nieght took the lead again, and the rookies fell into line behind her, moving in a perfectly silent single file through the now-eerily quiet room. Axilus tried not to look at the bodies as he stepped over them, his stomach turning at the sight of their heads split like an overripe melon.

They entered the corridor, slowly slinking down with everyone's eyes and ears fully alert. Szarus spun on his heel, carefully sweeping his rifle about their rear flank. He moved backwards just as quietly as forwards, Axilus enviously noted.

They had been moving this way for what had felt to him like hours, but had really probably only taken up the space of twenty minutes. Determined to keep the rest of her rookies alive, the LT had ordered them all to fall into a single file, to move as silently as a shadow. They cleared the rooms carefully, methodically. No alarms had been set off yet, which both pleased and confused Axilus, particularly with the number of bodies they were leaving behind, but maybe the slavers just hadn't noticed. Or maybe they were clearing them out, he supposed, seeing as they'd been seeing fewer and fewer slavers with each encounter. The four they'd just seen had been more than they'd seen in the last six rooms combined, where there had only been one or two. His civilian mind was joyous, hoping they'd almost cleared the ship, but a little voice whispered to his military side that something about it all just felt wrong, and to stay on his guard. He felt a bit more inclined to listen to the little voice. Better safe than sorry.

Another room. Szarus fired off two rapid-fire shots, and two bodies collapsed to the ground without even a cry. But they didn't move on this time, and Axilus lifted his head to see why.

The lieutenant had stopped next to a door, its external display blazing a brilliant red to indicate its engaged lock. She was crouched next to the door's control panel, her omnitool active, fingers flying across its interface with her mandibles pulled in close to her face. "This is our target," she stated simply in response to the confused stares. "Break into twos. Extract any survivors you find, I don't care what species they are."

"Ma'am?"

"These are slavers. No one deserves to be stolen from their home and sold into a life of servitude for the benefit of someone else." Her voice was cold, her eyes hard as steel. He got the impression either she or someone she knew had once been a slave, and wisely chose not to ask.

She struggled with the lock for a minute, then stood, the door's display flashing green before sliding open with a soft hiss. "Madelivio, Valerian, take the left. Caestero and Naeviuris, center. Domitiana, Aelianus, right. I'll take up top."

"Ma'am!"

He knew better than to ask.

His partner didn't wait for him to catch up, marching off without a word the moment the salute was complete. Axilus had to run to keep up to him. "A two-story cell block? How many cells do you think this place has?" He knew they had to have multiple cell blocks, obviously, if they wanted to transport enough slaves to make a profit, but he hadn't thought they'd have multiple floors.

Szarus didn't answer him for a minute. Then he glanced back at him, slowing his pace to an average walk. Axilus had to consciously withhold a flinch when he saw the other turian's missing mandible, lost in another confrontation with batarian slavers. He'd seen more action than the rest of them together, and he was still only a rookie. "They have a lot more than one block. Probably six, maybe eight. Could be up to twelve. Depends on the size of the cruiser." He turned his eyes to the ceiling, scanning the corridor they walked down as they moved. "This is a mediocre ship. Not massive, but not small. They probably have eight."

"How do you think the LT knew our guys were in this one?"

"Radio pings. Same way you found us."

"Right, forgot about those." The hostages had sent out a distress beacon via radio pings which could be tracked on the turian emergency channel, which just so happened to be linked to Lieutenant Nieght's visor. That had been how they'd learned of the incident in the first place. He made a mental note to thank Viridus for remembering something as little and yet as important as that, especially considering that without it they'd likely be dead by now.

He glanced down the corridor and paused. A reinforced door, the first door they'd seen, and a lot of them after it. "This must be the start of the cells." He looked back at Szarus. "You take the left side, I'll take the right?"

Szarus shrugged, "Fair enough," and moved to the first door on the left, trying the lock. "They're not unlocked, but it's an easy bypass. Should be quick enough to get them all open." His omnitool flashed and the door slid open, and he recoiled immediately, expression morphing into one of disgust. "Be careful, the batarians haven't cleared out the dead. You're not squeamish, are you?"

"Squeamish? Me? Please," Axilus scoffed, moving to bypass the first door on the right. He wasn't wonderful with computers, so he struggled a bit, but eventually the door slid open and he got a glimpse inside. "Empty. Lucky me."

They continued hacking open the doors on the way down the corridor, with limited success. Halfway through, they had three dead turians, a half-rotten thing that resembled a human, and a very angry krogan (who they elected to let loose on the slavers, and watched as he ran off screaming in search of batarian blood) to contend with. By the time they made it to the end, they still hadn't found a living turian, and had more or less resigned to the fact that everything they were finding was going to be dead. The LT wouldn't be happy, but it was the truth.

"If there's another krogan in this one, I'm going to throw something," Axilus joked as he initiated a bypass on the second to last door in the corridor, Szarus snorting from across the room. He braced himself as the door slid open, gun at the ready just in case whatever was on the other side was hostile.

The sight that greeted him nearly bowled him over instead.

A small form lay quivering in the corner of the claustrophobic cell, its head pressed against the cold metal wall and its trembling arms weakly wrapped around its knees in a vain attempt to keep warm. Broken glass littered the ground around it, and after a minute, Axilus recognized its enviro-suit and helmet as quarian, and gave a start.

"S-Szarus! I found a quarian, and it's alive!" he cried, already halfway inside the cell by the time the last word had escaped his mouth. "Shit, shit, can you hear me? Szarus, come here, we've got to get him help!"

The quarian, which he could now recognize as male by his style of suit, was pale, paler than could be healthy for any life form, his face dotted with beads of sweat and pockmarked by cuts and bruises. The glass, he realized, had once been his mask, presumably shattered by force when he'd been captured. One of his eyes was swollen shut, the other half-lidded and unseeing, and Axilus immediately found himself captivated by their color-- the whites of his eyes were a pale lilac, and his irises were some color so light, they looked white, even in the bad lighting. Pink foam bubbled at the corner of his mouth with each labored breath. He tried to brush some of the glass off the quarian's face, only to pull back when he shrank away with a pathetic whimper, noting somewhere in the back of his mind that the alien's skin was much too warm to be safe. Infection, he realized, he's got an infection. He was mumbling in a language even his universal translator couldn't grasp, but maybe he was just too quiet for it to pick it up.

Behind him, he heard an exclamation of shock and surprise as Szarus arrived, and together, the two of them managed to lift the quarian off the ground, wincing as he cried out in pain. He was badly injured, probably had broken bones, and he found himself questioning just what had happened to put him in such a sorry state.

"We've got to get him to the lieutenant," Szarus hissed, his eyes wide and mandibles fluttering in panic as Axilus carefully shifted his grasp on the quarian to take the stress off of his injuries. "He might be the only survivor, and he's badly injured. We have to get him somewhere sterile or he's going to _die_."

"I _know_ ," Axilus snapped, shifting his grasp on the quarian once more when he shifted and whimpered pathetically again. "Make sure there's nobody outside, and cover me. I don't think he can take anything else; he's barely holding together as it is."

Without another word, Szarus darted out the door, his rifle, last slung across his back, now clutched in his hands so tightly he was shaking. "Clear. Hurry though, we shouldn't take any chances."

Axilus changed his grip on the quarian once more, making positively certain he wouldn't be jarred any more than he absolutely had to be by his moving, then quickly hurried out the door and down the hall. The quarian (he was just going to call him Bruises, because his skin was practically one massive bruise) made a sad little sound and coughed, his one good eye opening slightly more. He looked alert, if only a little, and his lips moved, mouthing words Axilus couldn't understand before oblivion took him once more. His body started to tremble, his breathing quickening. Axilus quickened his pace; that couldn't be a good sign.

The trek down the corridor felt like it took hours, as if he were running through molasses. He was distinctly aware of the quarian in his arms, of every breath he took and every whimper of pain he made. The bloody foam at the corner of his mouth had grown more pronounced as whatever internal injuries he'd sustained grew worse, whether from the motion or just from time passed he couldn't tell, and a disturbing rattling sound had started to echo in his chest with every breath.

He hoped he was only overreacting and the symptoms didn't say what he was thinking they were saying, but he wasn't too confident. Times like this made him really miss the field medics that were supposed to accompany them on every mission, and he felt a pang of despair as his thoughts turned to Maena.

He shook the thought away. He had a task at hand to focus on; what had happened was done, and nothing could change it. Now he just had to focus on making sure this quarian lived to tell his tale.

Finally, he stumbled into the primary hallway they'd all split off from, realizing with a sinking feeling that the others were long gone, and he heard Szarus curse as he realized the same thing. "Keep moving!" Szarus all but yelled, pivoting around the corner and dashing down the hall, Axilus mere steps behind.

"They're probably on their way back to the ship, maybe some slavers ambushed them and drove them off...!"

"Just run, don't talk!"

He lost track of the time as they ran, focusing solely on regulating his breathing and pushing the pain from his burning legs to the back of his mind. The quarian in his arms curled against him, weakly clutching at one of his arms with a trembling tri-fingered hand, jarred into half-consciousness by the running. He was looking a little less like death, but maybe he was just imagining that, hoping he'd be all right and that he wouldn't die. His mind could play tricks on him sometimes when he was stressed out.

They'd been running for what felt like forever by the time he finally caught sight of something familiar. They must have run right through the room where they'd been ambushed, because this was one of the halls they'd come through when they'd first boarded. He recognized the locked observation room branching from it, remembered Oedirus leaning against the window, trying to see through and glean what the interior looked like, and felt a small swell of anger again in his chest when he remembered that he'd laid among the slain. "We're almost there," he panted through clenched teeth, mandibles fluttering in time with his racing heartbeat, "We're almost to the ship, we've almost made it-"

He suddenly skidded to the stop, face to face with the barrel of a gun.

Four eyes stared down the barrel of the shotgun at him, a triumphant sneer on his face. "Drop the quarian and put your hands over your head, turian," he growled in a low baritone. His finger tightened on the trigger. "Or I'll give you a new set of eyes."

He glanced out of the corner of his eye at Szarus, silently cursing when he saw the other turian still as stone, hands raised with an assault rifle leveled at his face and another pressed into the side of his head. Szarus was watching him out of the corner of his eyes, jaw clenched and muscles tight in fear. He nodded slowly to him, an attempt to reassure him. Then he glanced back at the batarian standing before him, remaining still.

"Move it, kid. Unless you think I'm joking." The shotgun came closer. "Do you think I'm joking?"

He didn't move. In the back of his mind, he noticed a palpable tension in the air that had nothing to do with their situation, his skin prickling slightly. The base of his skull felt like it was buzzing. The quarian had gone still, good eye closed tightly, breathing surprisingly even.

The batarian growled and jabbed his chest with the shotgun. "Are you deaf, or just stupid? I said move."

He was certain something was happening now. His teeth felt odd, as if he were chewing on foil, the buzzing had spread throughout the rest of his body, and the air felt positively charged with electricity. He glanced down at the quarian in confusion, wondering if he felt the same thing going on, and realized that the quarian's good eye was open again, and his white iris was glowing a bright blue. The same blue that was now pulsing almost invisibly over his skin.

"I was planning on sellin' you, but one is just as good as two-"

His eyes widened. The batarian raised his gun as if to strike him.

Then everything exploded.

* * *

 

Axilus regained consciousness to shouting. Slowly his vision returned, and through the ringing in his ears, he realized that it was Szarus, and he was calling his name. He sounded panicked. As feeling slowly returned to his body, replaced by a million pinpricks of pain, he realized that the other turian was shaking him.

"---ake up! Axilus! Are you alive? Wake up!"

The ringing in his ears grew louder, and he winced and closed his eyes tightly, as if the darkness behind his eyelids would bring silence.

Szarus shook him more incessantly. "Axilus! Thank the spirits you're alive-- we've got to move! What happened?" He sounded confused, or maybe more disturbed. Panicked. "What did you do, why did everything explode? I've never seen anything like-- We have to move!"

With Szarus's assistance, Axilus managed to sit up, rubbing his head with a grimace. The explosion had thrown him quite a way, he realized, and he couldn't see any trace of the batarians until he looked all the way across the room and spotted six splotches of blood on the wall with six motionless bodies beneath. His heart skipped as he realized what had just happened, how narrowly he'd somehow avoided death. Then he noticed the quarian lying mere paces away, motionless, and his muddled brain leaped into action.

He jumped to his feet, pushing past Szarus and rushing to kneel beside the fallen quarian. "Is he alive? Come on, wake up!" There wasn't much he could do to wake the quarian up, what with how injured he was, but he did his best, gently shaking him by the shoulder, then pressing his cool talon against his warm cheek.

That did the trick.

The quarian jolted to life, good eye opening wide as he flopped like a fish, struggling to turn over as his body was wracked with coughs so harsh it made both turians wince. When he finally managed to roll over, he pressed his forehead against the ground (or as close as he could with what was left of his mask blocking the way) and coughed. Axilus was alarmed to see spots of red spattering the deck beneath him, but said nothing. The coughing went on and on, until finally, the fit ended and the quarian was left heaving short, ragged gasps, struggling to catch his breath.

Axilus waited anxiously for him to recover, then hesitantly placed a hand on the alien's back, though he quickly removed it when the quarian jolted as if he'd been touched with a hot iron instead of a hand. "Are you okay?" he cautiously asked.

The quarian just panted in response, eye shut tight. His skin glowed in the shipboard lighting with a glistening coat of sweat, his skin even paler than before. He didn't answer.

The two turians exchanged a look, and Axilus sat back on his heels. "Szarus," he carefully began, "what, exactly, happened?"

Szarus looked perplexed, shrugging and shaking his head. "I honestly don't know. The batarian was threatening you. Then there was a huge explosion, and I woke up over there," he replied, pointing to a dented wall panel across the room. "I don't know what happened. The explosion reminds me of what the vids showed us about the Cabal units, but that's impossible, because there's no way a quarian can be a-"

"-biotic," Axilus realized with wide eyes. His brain was racing now. "It's the only explanation. The blue light, the energy, the explosion- the only thing is, why didn't it kill me?"

"Maybe because you were holding him? I don't know." Szarus's mandibles pulled in tight to his jaw. "Maybe he wasn't trying to kill you. Maybe it was just backfire that hit me and you."

"But I thought biotics were trained to be really in control of their powers."

"Maybe he wasn't trained." He shrugged. "Biotics can't be common in quarians. I've never even heard of such. Makes sense that he wouldn't be trained. Maybe he didn't even know he was biotic."

"Either way." Axilus huffed a little and struggled to his feet, reaching for the quarian again. "Help me get him up. We need to get him to the medbay, biotic or not. He's hurt, bad."

Szarus took his other arm and slung it around his shoulders, wrapping an arm around the quarian's waist. "Right. And we can ask the medics to see if it really was biotics. Who knows? Quarians are inventors, maybe it was some module that violently overloaded his shield." He seemed to like that idea more than the biotics idea. Axilus had to admit, the notion of a quarian biotic was pretty far-fetched. Biotics were born from exposure to eezo, and with a quarian's terrible immune system and pristine environments, enough exposure to create a biotic would probably be lethal. The quarians were the only galactic species who had never exhibited biotic potential, and likely never would. Until now, at least. He found it hard to believe himself, even considering what he'd seen and felt. But maybe he'd imagined it all. After all, was it even possible for a quarian biotic to exist? And the more he thought about it, the more plausible the overloaded shield sounded, and he decided to drop the idea of biotics entirely, unless the quarian tried to convince them otherwise.

He glanced back at the quarian, studying his pale skin, the dark rings under his eyes, the way he struggled to get a deep breath in despite, Axilus was sure, numerous broken ribs. He shook with fever, cold chills wracking his body as infection raged through him, his weak immune system helpless to stop it.

This wasn't a biotic, he decided. Biotics were tough. Resilient. They could survive almost anything; they had to, in order to survive manipulating the dark energy fields within their own bodies as a weapon. This quarian, regardless of what he'd seen or felt, was weak. Even if he wasn't battered and feverish, his body simply wasn't strong enough to handle the strain of biotics. It was impossible.

He glanced back up to Szarus, shaking his head. Szarus nodded. "Shield overload. It's the only explanation."

"Either way, he needs to get to the medbay."

"Agreed."

Slowly, both of them holding the quarian tightly between them, they inched down the hall, stepping over bodies with smashed heads and caved-in chests and limbs twisted at unnatural angles, carefully avoiding the pools of cooled blood and scattered bits of flesh and gore that coated the floor beneath them. Szarus was unperturbed, but Axilus found it harder and harder to look away, even as sickened as the sight made him feel.

These men were dead because of him. Maybe not directly, but close.

His mind flashed back to the moment before everything went white, before the very air around him burst into cold fire. The quarian in his arms, his skin shimmering with a rippling blue glow, tantalizing lilac eyes shining pale blue. The explosion was the same color.

Overloaded shields didn't do that.

The prickling rippled through his body, gathering in a cold, metallic burn at the base of his skull. His skin tingled where it was close in proximity to the quarian. His hands shook.

Shields didn't do that.

The blast didn't hit him, but exploded from within him, in tandem with the quarian. He staggered back, dropped the quarian, collapsed. Saw Szarus out of the corner of his eye, back slamming into the wall, sliding down with an inaudible groan.

His body tingled.

He felt Szarus jolt before he heard him yelp, saw him pull away, hold the quarian to his chest. The quarian was shaking, flickers of blue dancing across his bare skin. Szarus's eyes were wide. He was speaking, but no sound reached his ears. Everything was blue and white and too bright. The base of his skull burned.

Someone grabbed him.

The burning vanished and his body went limp, breaking at the knees as if he were a puppet with its strings cut. Someone caught him before he fell, held him steady by his elbow. They were talking, but the ringing in his ears drowned them out. A female turian appeared before his hazy eyes, and she gently lowered him to his knees. He recognized the dark tattoo arcing over one eye, the pale coloration, the radiant green eyes.

"Take it easy," Lieutenant Nieght was saying, one hand on his shoulder and the other on his cheek, steadying him. "Relax. You're too tense."

"I..." His voice failed him, and he shook his head to try to clear it. The LT kept him steady. Then he tried again. "What... happened?"

"You tell me." She sat back on her heels, watching him passively. Her face was steady, stern, but he could see concern in her eyes. "Valerian told me you two were transporting an injured quarian to the ship when you collapsed. Do you remember anything?" Her voice was as passive as her expression, but still he detected a hint of concern, and her tone was softer than he remembered it being.

He shook his head again, reaching a hand up to rub under his eyes. "I don't... I don't remember," he admitted, looking down. "I got tired all of a sudden. My body felt sort of like it was... buzzing. I don't know. It was weird."

"I see." She watched him for a moment, then stood with a sigh, offering him a hand. "You look all right. Perfectly healthy, physically. But I want you to visit the medbay. Have them do a full examination, try to figure out what caused your little..." Her mandibles twitched in some expression he didn't recognize. "... episode."

She didn't look disappointed, he decided, despite his expectations. After everything that had happened, he'd expected she would be angry with him, or maybe at least disappointed, but instead, she was concerned for him. It both surprised and relieved him; instead of the lecture he'd been expecting (though maybe she was planning to give it to him later), he just had to go spend some time in the medbay, letting the doctors poke over him and examine every part of him so they could figure out why he'd almost fainted.

He shuddered. On second thought, maybe the medbay was worse than a lecture. At least lecturing didn't involve needles.

A thought occurred to him, and he paused, looking around. Then he looked back to the lieutenant, panicked. "Where's the quarian? Is he alive? Did I hurt him?"

Lieutenant Nieght shook her head, raising a hand as if to deflect his questions. "Calm down. I had one of the others transport him to the medbay; he's badly injured and needs medical attention, but I doubt it was in any way your fault. He's safe; you can see him in the medbay when you get there, if it will ease your conscience."

He relaxed with a sigh. "Oh, good. Thank you, ma'am..."

A sudden cough at his side made him jump, and he looked over his shoulder, then smiled. "Frieya, you going to escort me?" he asked, watching the LT drift off to talk to Szarus out of the corner of his eye.

Frieya was smiling again, though this time, it looked less genuine and more like a mask. He wondered just how worried she'd been. She was a worrywart anyway, and after having lost as many people as she had on the mission already, hearing that Axilus had had an 'episode' couldn't have done her worrying any good. "The lieutenant asked me to make sure you make it to the medbay all right," she quietly said, looking him over. "I heard you fainted. They wouldn't tell me what happened."

" 'fraid I can't be much help there," Axilus mumbled, rubbing under his eyes again and sheepishly fluttering his mandibles. "I fainted. Or, almost, at least. Everything got really fuzzy. If you want to know what happened, I'd ask Szarus." He was planning to ask him anyway; not knowing what had happened was unnerving.

"Do you think it was blood loss?" she questioned, motioning to his sole now-scabbed injury. "Maybe the fatigue finally caught up to you and knocked you off your feet for a minute."

"Maybe." He shrugged. "I don't know."

She shook her head and sighed, and reached for his arm. "Come on; either way, you need to get to the medbay. The lieutenant wants to make sure it won't happen again, and that you're not bleeding or injured and going to get worse or something."

"Right." He grimaced. "Not looking forward to the needles."

"Does anyone?"

He chuckled, and she grinned. Her genuine smiles were much prettier than her faked ones. It made him feel sort of fuzzy inside.

"Come on." He took her hand and held it tight. "Let's go."

As they walked away, something clicked in his head, and the training vids he'd been shown as a child began playing to his mind's eye. The ones about humans. The humans were soft and squishy, with strange protrusions on their fleshy faces they called lips that they liked to paint bright colors, like facepaint but not. He remembered being utterly perplexed by their appearance, and their many colors. The humans liked to twist their lips into shapes to express emotions, like a turian would use their mandibles and their subvocals, but much more crude. He and his friends had liked to joke about how weird it looked, and tried to imitate it with their mandibles, but it never looked right. It only ever looked alien.

The image of Lieutenant Commander Nieght returned to the forefront of his mind, with that odd spread of her mandibles, the strange expression he hadn't recognized, and he realized he did know the expression after all.

She had smiled.


	3. Don't Judge a Huntress By Her Occupation

Their mission was more successful than Axilus had originally thought, he realized the moment he was escorted through the ship and into the medbay.

Evidently the other teams had had much more success than he and Szarus; filling the beds were a mish mash of turians and humans and asari, some visibly wounded, others perfectly healthy as far as he could tell. He was surprised to see that someone had even managed to track down the krogan that he and Szarus had let loose on the batarians, and he was sitting curled up on one of the beds, visibly exhausted but obviously pleased with himself through the splatters of alien blood coating his hide. He grinned (or, at least, he thought it was a grin, maybe he just felt like baring his teeth) at Axilus as he passed by, giving him a nod, and Axilus hesitantly returned it as he stepped around another harried-looking nurse bustling from bed to bed.

"Here we are." Freiya turned and gently urged Axilus towards one of the last empty beds, sitting in the back corner of the medbay, far from the commotion surrounding the survivors from the slaver ship. "Sit down, the nurses said they'll be here in a moment."

He moved to sit, blinking up at her. "Where's the quarian?" he asked quietly, keeping his voice low enough that their injured teammates lying in the beds around him wouldn't hear. "I didn't see him on the way in."

"He's..." She hesitated, then continued. "He's in critical care, in the back." His heart felt like it dropped out of his chest. "They said he had infection. Bad. Like, bad enough that they're worried he won't... survive."

He struggled to find the words to respond, managing, after a minute, a hoarse, "Are you sure?"

She looked uneasy, but nodded. "They said... Well, it's bad, really bad, but they're trying to get him stabilized, they said, it's just taking a lot of..." She trailed off.

"... keep me updated." He met her eyes, and reached for her hand. "Tell me if anything happens to him. Promise."

Freiya paused. Then she nodded and squeezed his hand tightly. "I will. As soon as I know something, I'll tell you." Then she gently reached with her free hand, pushing lightly against his shoulder. "Lie down. They want you to relax while you're in here."

He did so, reluctantly, and shifted in an attempt to make himself comfortable. The cots in the medbay were horrifically uncomfortable, and it felt like no matter what way he moved, the ache in his back only grew. He wasn't looking forward to staying here for any extended period of time. Especially if they were going to be poking and prodding at him constantly, doing tests and studying his wound and spirits knew what else. He shuddered unwillingly, raising his head and opening his mouth to bid Freiya goodbye.

He stopped and looked around instead, stunned. She'd vanished, and without even a goodbye. How unlike her.

With a heavy sigh, Axilus settled back and stared at the stark white ceiling of the medbay, doing his best to block out the commotion and shouting going on around him, focusing instead on thinking.

It still bothered him, he realized, just how little he knew about why what had happened had, well, happened. Why had he fainted like that? What was that buzzing from deep within his muscles, reaching up and digging its burning cold little fingers into the base of his skull? Had it been the quarian's doing, or was it something else? Something within him, something made wrong by the explosion? A shudder ran down his spine, and suddenly he was thankful for the tests the doctors were to run, knowing that soon, or soon enough, he'd find out exactly what had happened. Maybe. Hopefully.

His spine was tingling again, he realized, and he clenched his shaking hands into fists, closing his eyes. Inhale, exhale. Nice and easy.

Slowly, the buzzing faded.

Whatever this was, it had something to do with his emotions, and that was disturbing.

He heard a shuffling sound beside him, the sound of civilian boots and something heavier on the metal floor. He opened his eyes and turned his head slightly, blinking at the pair of turians now standing at his side, one in civvies and the other in uniform. He recognized the one in uniform.

"Lieutenant Nieght?" He sat up quickly, snapping a salute, and she waved a hand.

"At ease, Madelivio." Her arms were folded behind her back, and the passive air had returned to her eyes and voice. "I'm not here as your superior right now. I'm here to help figure out what's wrong with you."

He blinked, his mandibles fluttering in confusion. "Do you know?"

"I have an idea," she breezily replied, her tone suggesting he drop the topic. The doctor began to examine his wound, but she remained where she stood. "I heard your quarian friend is in intensive. Took quite a battering from the batarians. Gunshot wounds, burns, cuts, bruises, fractures, more than one broken bone, and a nasty infection to top it all off. They're saying he has a 14% chance of survival, you know."

Axilus flinched, and she continued.

"But I'm sure he'll live. He seems the strong sort." Suddenly she was looking at him with an almost predatory look in her eyes, mandibles tight to her cheeks. "Valerian told me he exhibited something resembling biotic potential. An... explosive power, if I remember right. Was he telling me the truth?"

"I..." He hesitated, contemplating a lie, then nodded slowly. "Yes, ma'am. I thought it was biotics at first, it reminded me of the vids about the Cabal units, but..."

He trailed off, uncomfortable beneath her hard stare.

She waited for him to continue, then shook her head as if disappointed. "Madelivio, if this quarian is a biotic, you do realize he would be the first confirmed quarian biotic in recent history, correct?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"And you do realize how unlikely this is, correct?"

"Yes, ma'am." He was starting to wonder where she was going with this.

She shifted her weight to one foot, tilting her head slightly. That odd expression returned, and he vaguely recalled that he'd determined it to be a smile. "I have no doubts that he is, indeed, a biotic." He started in surprise, but she continued, not allowing him a place to interject, "Everything Valerian told me matches the description of a biotic attack. The color, the force, the fact that you, despite being so close, weren't burned... it all matches up."

Axilus blinked. "You're sure, ma'am? We were thinking it might have been a module that forcefully overloaded his shield, or..."

"No." She shook her head. "It was biotics. From the preliminary medical reports I've read, he exhibits the sort of eezo signature a human biotic might. Physical scans show something that may be a biotics implant at the base of his skull. Then there's what you two witnessed. Everything matches up."

"I..." He sat back, bewildered. "... a quarian biotic? You mean, we're not insane after all?"

She shrugged. "I can see how you would think it was an overload module. Quarians are great with technology, and the idea of a quarian biotic is laughable in most cases. But no, you are not, in fact, insane." Suddenly, she looked very serious again. "But remember, we don't know for certain. We'll have to question him once he wakes up," he noticed she'd stressed the word 'once', "to get it all straightened out."

The doctor backed away from him, eyes flicking up to meet the lieutenant's. Lieutenant Nieght nodded, and the doctor turned back to him. "You're lucky," he began, flaring his mandibles almost condescendingly. "Your kinetic barriers took the kick out of everything. The bullet that struck you must have been a ricochet, slow enough that the barriers didn't activate but fast enough to penetrate. It's hardly even a flesh wound." Then his expression turned serious, so serious it made him shiver. "I don't know yet what caused you to faint. I can't see any signs of slow-acting tranquilizers, and nothing else could cause such a reaction except an underlying medical problem."

Lieutenant Nieght cleared her throat, and the doctor gave a start and began again.

"However, your commanding officer here provided an interesting suggestion which I find myself inclined to entertain." The doctor shifted his weight to one foot, crossing his arms. "It's possible the exposure to the quarian's biotic abilities may have triggered latent biotic abilities of your own."

Axilus's jaw dropped. The doctor kept on speaking.

"During boot camp, you were identified as a possible biotic by medics, but displayed no biotic potential when tested. Latents aren't uncommon, though, and, like you, often pass through testing without exhibiting anything even remotely usable until activated by secondary exposure. The exposure to the quarian's mass effect fields may have been that needed spark to activate your own. With your body being unused to biotic stress, your energy was rapidly depleted and you fell unconscious. This may also explain your reaction to the earlier biotic explosion." He coughed, and Lieutenant Nieght gave him a dirty look out of the corner of her eye. "Mind you, this is all conjecture. We'll need to perform more tests-"

"I'm certain this is why you fainted," Lieutenant Nieght loudly said, cutting the doctor off with a cheeky flare of her mandibles. He almost laughed at the gesture; the renowned Lieutenant Commander Caheen Nieght had a rebellious streak. Go figure. "And after the doc does what he has to to convince himself of it, I want to begin training you."

His heart skipped a beat, and his eyes widened slowly. "Training me? I- wh- Ma'am?"

The warm look had returned to her eyes, and she nodded slowly. "Training you, yes. If you're a biotic, you realize you'll need to know how to use your powers in combat. And who better to learn from than your own commanding officer?"

"I-" He sputtered, mind racing. He almost felt flustered, but something inside him was overjoyed, and he felt the joy much more strongly than the nerves. "But, ma'am, I... I thought biotics had to be taught by, y'know, biotics?" Wow, that sounded much less stupid in his head.

She laughed.

He paused, looking up at her in bewilderment. "Ma'am?"

She had a wide grin on her face, that odd bastardization of a human smile he'd seen before, and her arms were spread wide, head cocked knowingly. "You'd be right."

Slowly, the realization dawned on him, and he gaped. "No way."

The "grin" grew wider, and she nodded. "You're looking at a former Cabalite right here, kiddo. Dropped the schtick years ago to join a spec ops squad. Dropped that to join the training corps. You're one lucky kid."

"You're a-" His eyes widened, the memories of all the vids he'd religiously camped in front of as a child, captivated by the explosions of rippling blue and white thrown by graceful turians of every size and color, suddenly flashing to the forefront of his mind. His commander was a Cabalite. One of his childhood idols. He just couldn't wrap his mind around it. "You're- you're joking, right, ma'am?" Some part of him hoped this was a cruel joke. The rest was ecstatic.

She grinned. Even the doctor beside her gaped.

Axilus sat back, running a hand over his fringe. It took a minute for his voice to come back, and even then all he could say was a hoarse, "Spirits."

Lieutenant Nieght looked pleased with herself, moving back into his line of sight. "As soon as you've been released from the medbay, I want you to meet me in Cargo Hold A-3."

"Ma'am...?"

Her eyes were almost twinkling. "I want to see what you can do."

* * *

 

Axilus's body was numb, and yet it wasn't. This would have been easier if it was. His skin prickled beneath his plates, his eyes burned, his muscles protested even the tiniest movement. And yet Lieutenant Nieght wouldn't let him take a break.

"Again!" His muscles screamed as he struggled to call up the smallest bit of energy from his exhausted core, but what little he'd had left after the things he'd been through so recently was long gone. The wisps of blue at the tips of his talons fizzled and sputtered and faded into nothingness.

"I need a break," he panted through gritted teeth, daring to drop his hands to his knees and breathe. He didn't care right now if she thought he was pathetic, his muscles felt like they were burning. A minute's break would have him back in working order... hopefully.

"We don't have time for that." Lieutenant Nieght grabbed him by the elbow and dragged him back upright, her cold eyes flashing ice blue in the bad light of the cargo hold. "Again."

He flared his mandibles and jerked his arm away, growling. At this point, he was far too tired to care about insubordination. "No."

Her eyes narrowed, mandibles tensing. "Excuse me?"

"I'm _tired_. I need a break."

"You won't get a break in battle," the lieutenant hissed, eyes narrowing nearly to slits. Her muscles tensed, head lowered in a challenging position. "Learn to handle exhaustion. Embrace it. Or you'll never survive in combat."

Lieutenant Commander Caheen Nieght was an excellent soldier. A wonderful teacher. A decorated veteran. He understood her training methods and why she thought they were necessary, considering her colorful past. But damn did she need to learn not to work kids to death. Honestly, they'd been working nonstop for what must have been hours now, and he hadn't had a break since the medbay. He was understandably getting slightly pissed off at this point.

He mimicked her stance, flaring his mandibles wide and lowering his subvocals to make himself seem bigger and more intimidating. "I'm not in combat. I'm not a Cabalite- they don't even know I exist. I'm a soldier, and soldiers need rest. I don't care what your reasoning is."

Lieutenant Nieght's eyes narrowed and her body tensed. For a moment, Axilus was afraid he'd made a terrible mistake; he knew for sure he couldn't last in a battle against someone of her caliber, particularly should she decide to start flinging around Warps and Singularities again. But, luckily, she relaxed, relented, and raised her shoulders. Her simmering rage morphed into a cheeky sneer. "Fine, then. But I'm adding an hour on to your training." Axilus's jaw dropped. "One hour per minute's rest."

"But- but that's not fair!"

She did that odd human grin again- he wondered if she even knew she was doing it- and shrugged, another oddly human gesture she'd apparently picked up. "It's only fair. You're taking away from training time. Valuable time you could be using to learn to control your biotics, but you instead choose to waste claiming all your youthful vigor has run its course. You'll need to make it up, and to make up for your insubordination."

"But-!"

"I don't want to hear it." Her expression flattened, mandibles tight against her jaw and subvocals dropping to dangerous lows. "You heard me. Break and an extra few hours, or no break and we end in twenty minutes." She raised her shoulders in that human-ish shrug gesture again, her eyes never leaving his. "Your choice."

He stared at her. She stared back. The hold was suddenly very quiet.

A loud wooshing sound broke the silence and Lieutenant Nieght ducked, narrowly avoiding being smashed in the face by a suddenly-weightless crate of small arms, her eyes laughing as she came back up though she somehow managed to keep her expression calm. Axilus quivered with anger, noticing only afterwards the blue rippling over his skin, and he quickly clenched his fists and tried to push the rage back down. Yep, definitely fueled by emotion.

The mask cracked. Lieutenant Nieght beamed. "You've got potential, kid. Do that again and we'll end in ten."

* * *

 

They had only trained for ten minutes more, as Lieutenant Nieght had promised. By the time they were finished, Axilus was certain his body was about to give out on him, his limbs quivering and breath coming in short, tiny gasps that made his head spin. The wall was the only thing keeping him upright.

Lieutenant Nieght dusted her hands off, mandibles spreading into that odd smile he'd become so accustomed to. Her eyes were surprisingly warm now, compared to their iciness not fifteen minutes ago. "We're done," she stated with a breezy shrug. She didn't seem to be winded in the slightest, Axilus noticed with a twinge of jealousy. "You did well. Told you that you were capable of more than you thought."

He couldn't answer, only nodded breathlessly and slumped and tried to straighten out his breathing before he fainted. It took some serious effort, but he managed. "Th-thank you..." he managed to mumble after a minute.

Her omnitool blinked. Lieutenant Nieght stared at him for a second, then smiled and turned away, examining the message with a soft, dual-toned hum.

Her expression morphed from peace to shock and she scanned the image once, twice, then closed it quickly and turned to Axilus, eyes hard again. "Hurry up and catch your breath," she ordered, moving to help him up from where he'd unceremoniously fell to the floor the moment she had turned her back. Her expression was unnervingly blank. "Your friend just woke up."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> V short chapter, but that's because this is basically a little intermission before we get into the meat of the fic. :D Longer chapters incoming! Just bear with me.


	4. Good First Impressions Make All the Difference

"How bad is it?"

Axilus knew the answer before it came, watching the doctor's brow plates furrow over slightly narrowing eyes and his mandibles flutter, and his shoulders slumped, though he didn't say a word.

"Not good," the doctor finally answered after a long silence with a sigh, shaking his head. He pressed his mandibles up close to his cheeks and glanced back at the half-opaque glass separating the three of them from the quarantine room. "He took some serious hits aboard that ship. It's a miracle he's still alive."

"But how bad is it?" Lieutenant Nieght repeated, crossing her arms and adopting a distinctly-human posture of disapproval, shifting her weight mostly to one foot and jutting one sharp hip out, mandibles spread in an expression of disappointment. The tilt of her head made the medbay's lights catch on her eyes, making them almost glow and giving off a very displeased vibe. She'd been around humans too much, he decided. Too many human mannerisms. He could almost see the human frown on features clearly not meant for such an expression. "You haven't answered my question. I expect an answer." She frowned, brow plates lowering. "A straight one. My boys died saving this kid, the least you could do to honor them is tell me if it was all in vain."

The doctor was quiet for a moment, glancing back and forth from the prone form in quarantine to the still-waiting and still displeased form of his superior. Then he sighed again, hard enough his mandibles rattled against his jaw.

"He's dehydrated. Malnourished. Severe blood loss from numerous wounds, both internal and external. Inflammation and infection at almost every injury, and with his fever as high as it is, it's a miracle his brain hasn't cooked inside his skull yet, if the extranet is correct. We're lucky we were able to take the swelling down at all, with how bad everything is."

He sounded so tired. Axilus supposed he had reason to; he and the rest of the medical staff had been treating this one patient, this seemingly-beyond hopeless alien, for hours now, almost as long as he'd been onboard. No rest, no breaks, just constantly trying to save his life, and it was beginning to look and sound like it was all in vain.

The doctor continued. "There was so much damage to his suit that we actually had to requisition a brand new one from the Migrant Fleet. Holes from gunshot entry and exit wounds, rips, tears, cuts, burns, and that's only the suit ruptures." He was ticking things off on his fingers now. "His air filter was blown, his CO2 scrubber was shot, his implants were overloaded, almost all of his suit seals were blown out by what looks like electrocution, and let's not even get into the broken mask. Someone wanted this kid dead, or didn't care if he died. We almost couldn't stabilize him in time."

"But you _did_ stabilize him."

"Somehow." The doctor didn't look too confident, but the lieutenant accepted his statement as fact and continued on.

"You said you had to requisition a new suit?"

"Yes, and don't worry, the expense was negligible. There was just too much damage-- we couldn't fix it, not with how little we actually know about how their suits work. I mean, we could have tried, but I guarantee that would have been more trouble than it's worth." He suddenly looked skeptical, raising a brow plate and looking at the lieutenant with a distinct frown. "It's just a _quarian_. Why are you so intent on helping him? There's _enough_ of them running around loose without us adding another irresponsible teenager to the bunch."

The lieutenant froze, and Axilus was sure he saw something like rage flit across her face before her features settled back into stony cold. This woman had remarkable self-control, he noted. Even with his mother's lessons, he wasn't sure he could stand a comment like that and not backhand the motherfucker who backtalked him.

"While you're aboard this ship and answering to me, you would do well to remember that I have a _zero tolerance policy_ when it comes to xenophobia," she replied, her voice as steely cold as her face. She kept her mandibles tight against her jaw, though he still saw an angry quiver in the one closest to him. "He was there. He survived. My boys died to get him out. That's all that matters. As far as any of us are concerned, he is an equal to any turian, and will be treated as such." She leaned in close to the doctor, flaring her mandibles, and the doctor scuttled back a step, effectively unnerved. " _Do I make myself clear_."

The doctor didn't answer, only nodded quickly.

As quick as the rage had come, it passed, and she abruptly leaned back and crossed her arms before her again, eyes passive and face relaxed. The doctor, however, remained tense, and Axilus remained in the "should I flee or should I not" position. "You said he woke up. Yet he appears now to be unconscious. Why is that?"

The doctor fought for his voice, finding it after several seconds. "He's still too badly injured. When he came to, well, we were still working on him. He panicked- screamed, actually, spooked our trainees pretty badly- and we almost made a lethal mistake in our operations." He coughed nervously. "So we, ah, put him out again. Enough sedatives to knock down a krogan. Seemed to work well enough, I think. He hasn't shown any signs of cognition for an hour now."

The lieutenant's mandibles fluttered, and the doctor flinched. "You gave him a _krogan's_ dose?"

"He wasn't responding to the regular dose, and we had to keep upping the amount until we were an inch from a krogan's dose, so we just..." His voice trailed off for a second, and then he shrugged. "Went with it. It worked, anyway." He suddenly looked curious, or at least deep in thought. "We theorized it has something to do with his biotics, but we aren't sure, or perhaps he's just worked up a resistance to the sedatives we commonly use. Interesting... something to test later."

Lieutenant Nieght waved a hand to dismiss the topic. Apparently the science of keeping people comatose didn't interest her all that much. That, or she didn't want to think about what was going to happen to the poor kid once he recovered and the Council got their hands on him. He was, after all, a rare quarian biotic. Science had a disturbing interest in the rare, sapient or not. "How soon will he wake up? When can we talk to him?"

"Talk to him?" The doctor looked bewildered. "Lieutenant, you do realize he's probably delirious from fever and infection, right? Even if he wakes up today, it'll take a week to get through his system, maybe more if it's bad enough. And considering his apparent prognosis..." He shook his head. "This quarian's immune system is twice as bad as the average quarian's, and that's saying something. I'd bet it's due to his biotics, but I can't be sure. The only thing I'm positive of is that he won't be anywhere near coherent anytime soon."

"Do we at least know something about him? Anything that we can use to gather information? A name, where he was taken from..." Lieutenant Nieght prompted, looking frustrated beyond belief. Axilus could sympathize; he'd thought a doctor would give more consideration to the fact that this was a quarian, and a young one at that, who had shown biotic potential, but apparently the xenophobia was a little more deeply-rooted than scientific curiosity.

"Oh, yes, we know his name. Scanned it off his omni-tool." The doctor shrugged. "Thie'Haasn nar Olyna, whatever good that does you. As far as where he was kidnapped from, I would ask the other survivors. Maybe that krogan."

"The krogan?" Axilus chose this as the moment to express his bewilderment, brow plates furrowing and mandibles fluttering in confusion. "Why would a krogan care about a quarian?"

"He kept coming in while we were operating, and we had to keep escorting him back out. Something about being worried about the 'little pyjak' or whatever. I don't know, all right? I don't get paid to talk to krogan outside of urgent medical matters."

"Where is the krogan?" the lieutenant interjected, and the doctor huffed.

"One of the cargo holds. Reported there with one of the asari." He shrugged. "Don't know why you're so interested in what he has to say, anyway. I wouldn't trust a krogan's word as far as I could throw him." Then he huffed. "Look, I have more important things to do than argue about xenophobia with my commanding officer. I'll be in the main medical wing if you need me."

The two of them watched him part in silence. Then Lieutenant Nieght snorted. "What a moron."

"Ma'am?"

"He doesn't know to recognize a potential scientific breakthrough when he sees one." She glanced back at him, a faint smile evident on her plates and in her posture. "A biotic quarian. Who'd have thought?"

Axilus glanced back at the quarian, greedily drinking in the sight he knew very few had witnessed before him. Seeing the quarian without all the blood and grime and swelling covering every inch of exposed flesh was bizarre. Axilus had thought he'd seen enough of the guy to work out what he looked like beneath it all, but seeing him lying serenely in the medbay, broken mask and thoroughly-destroyed envirosuit nowhere to be seen, with only the cuts and bruises and receding inflammation of infection and the faint alien, pinkish-red tinge of fever marring his features took his breath away.

His skin was pale, lightly tinged with violet, and flushed with fever. One eye was still swollen shut, a thin thermal pack carefully secured over it with medical tape, and he could see bruised red and bright purple spidering out from beneath it. The bruises stretching up one cheek and outlining the other eye were a painful violet ringed with dark red and pink, broken up here and there by pale lines and dimly-glowing geometric shapes he faintly recognized as cybernetic implants which stretched down his neck and into the thin medical dress the doctors had hurriedly strapped on his body. It was too big at the top, meant for a turian's cowl and carapace, and hung baggy, but it did its work. Aside from the bruises, his skin was split here and there with thin, jagged, angry red lines where the glass from his shattered mask had hit him like a glass shower, though the doctors had done well in healing most of the marks up. His hair was almost jet black, the sides carefully shaved with a thin braid headed with blue beads hanging loose at his temple. His legs were odd; they were still bruised, but most of the skin there was pale, almost translucent, and the telltale signs of cybernetics were doubly clear. It looked painful, and Axilus found himself wondering how the alien had managed to put up with something so obviously agonizing for as long as he probably had. No doubts now he was strong as hell.

The quarian almost looked peaceful, a definite improvement from when Axilus had found him curled up and probably delusional in the slaver's containment cell. If it hadn't been for the sedatives feeding into his arm and the breather on his face, he was certain he'd have mistaken the quarian as asleep instead of basically lying trapped in a medically-induced coma.

This quarian was _damn_ strong, he finally realized, completely different from what he'd originally thought the alien to be on the slaver ship. Aside from somehow being a biotic, which would have meant somehow surviving exposure to dust-form eezo in utero and then living through the complications of exposure after birth, along with an apparently-doubly weakened immune system, this quarian had survived being captured by slavers, beaten, probably tortured, and left to rot in the brig for spirits-knew-how-long. He survived an untreated infection, a raging fever, dehydration, malnutrition, and exposure to contaminated air long enough to be rescued, and then he beat the sedatives and woke up when he wasn't supposed to after draining what little energy he had left in a biotic explosion strong enough to kill six batarians. And then it had taken a dose of sedatives strong enough to take down a raging krogan to knock him out again.

He hoped the quarian survived this whole ordeal, because if he did, he wanted a damn autograph.

"Do you think he's gonna make it?" he finally asked, refusing to look away from the quarian.

Lieutenant Nieght audibly shrugged. "Who knows? I'd say right now, his odds are looking damn good. Not very often a guy survives what he went through, then wakes up on the table in the middle of surgery. If he can do that, I think he can beat an infection, don't you? Be a shame to be taken down by a fever after all that."

He couldn't help a snort, shaking his head. "That'd be a damn shame, ma'am."

They were both quiet for a moment. Then Axilus looked back to the lieutenant. "What about the krogan, ma'am?"

"What about him?"

"Don't you want to find out what he knows, ma'am? I mean, maybe they were taken from the same colony. Or something." He gave a little shrug. "Only reason I can think he'd be worried about someone who isn't even his species."

She lowered her head, thinking. "That's a fair point. We could learn something about when they were captured if you're right, something that might help us track their movements, possibly, prevent this from happening to someone else..." She nodded. "All right, I'll go talk to him." Her voice took on a sympathetic tone, and she gently urged him towards one of the unoccupied chairs sitting around the observation room. "You should take a break. "We've been training for a while, and working with biotics is exhausting even when you _are_ used to the exertion."

Hell, he wasn't one to look a gift horse in the mouth. When your hardass commanding officer tells you to take a break, you take a damn break. Axilus plopped down with a grateful sigh, and looked back up at her. "Thanks, ma'am. I'll keep an eye on the quarian for you."

"All right." She smiled that odd smile again and sauntered towards the door. "I'll be right back. You get some shut-eye; you deserve it."

* * *

  
Axilus awoke from the first good sleep in his insomnia-haunted military career to knocking.

He blinked blearily, stretching and stifling a yawn as he slid from the uncomfortable position he'd unwittingly fallen asleep in. His joints creaked, his muscles groaned, and as he struggled back into consciousness, he slowly remembered why waking up after training was somehow worse than the training itself.

He groaned something to himself about feeling like shit- what an understatement that was- and struggled to stand. On the way up, he caught sight of a blurry figure out of his peripherals, and froze.

"I was wondering when you'd wake up," a crisp, heavily accented voice grumbled, slightly muffled and a tad staticky, as if from a speaker. "Where am I?"

Axilus paused. Stared. Then leaped to his feet, soreness forgotten. "Holy shit, you're awake!"

The quarian suddenly looked just as concerned as he felt, leaping back a step and nearly tripping over the messy tubing connected to his arms. His luminescent eyes were wide, and his body was tense as if he'd just seen a ghost. His voice was almost inaudible with shock. "Councilor?"

"Councilor?" Axilus hesitated, then began frantically searching the room, frazzled and still-drowsy mind making the connection between the word and expected conduct and eventually arriving at the conclusion that someone needed an urgent salute from him, and that someone was in this very room. It took him several seconds to realize that he was still alone, and several minutes for his heart to slow again. "I, uh- you mean me?"

The quarian blinked several times, watching him like an owl. His body was still tense, muscles rigid, in a pseudo-fighting stance despite his numerous casts and obvious pain. For a moment, he looked concerned, maybe panicked. Then his expression smoothed, and his body relaxed. "What's your name?"

"I, uh- Axilus. Madelivio." He shook his head, trying to clear the sleepy fog from it. "You're, uh, Thie, right? Thie'Haasn?"

The quarian paused. Looked like he was contemplating. Then decided Axilus was worth a response and nodded. "I'd offer you my hand, but, well." He rapped his knuckles against the glass between them and shrugged. Then that cool expression overtook him once more. Axilus was a bit envious of the sheer control he was showing over his emotions; years of meditation and he was still nowhere near having that much control. Lucky. "Where am I? What happened?"

"Uh... you don't know?"

"I just woke up from a coma," the alien replied in a deadpan, "and it's hard enough to keep my thoughts together, forget about trying to _remember_ anything. You probably know ten times what I do about my situation. Easier for you to tell me than it is for me to try to make sense of the chaos."

"Right. Um..."

He thought for a minute. Then he buried his face in his hands, scrubbed at his eyes, and looked around incredulously. "What time _is_ it? How long was I out?"

The quarian- Thie- looked amused, and shrugged. "I just woke up a few minutes ago. You were out cold. Couldn't wake you up, no matter how loud I got. Couldn't find a door out. Ancestors know how long you've been sitting there, dead to the world." He cracked a smile beneath the breather concealing half of his face. Then he grimaced and pressed the heel of his palm, the one without the sting, to his forehead. "Keelah, my head hurts."

"Your _head_ hurts?" He couldn't believe what he was hearing, or what was happening. This guy was somehow awake, after having been doped up with enough sedatives to knock out a krogan, with enough injuries to make a grown turian faint, and he was complaining about his _head_? "I- Look, ah, this is- this is a little above me, okay? Maybe I should- maybe I should call in some higher-ups... or a doctor, that might be good..."

The quarian's eyes widened, and he shook his head hard. " _No_. No more doctors."

Right, he had woken up for the first time while under the knife. He was probably sick to death of doctors.

"Where's my suit?" the quarian continued, now looking mildly concerned. "And would you please tell me where I am? How many times do I have to ask?"

Right. He needed to do his best to answer his questions, keep him calm until one of the doctors- or the LT, that would work too- decided to check back up on him. Though, considering how they'd left the quarian, that could be another few hours, he realized. Damn. Better do his best anyway, at least until he got a chance to call one of them in. "Um... Well, your suit was fucked, I mean _really_ fucked, so they had to requisition a new one from the Fleet. And you're, um, aboard the HSV Anchrivos, a, uh, turian training ship. We're set to dock soon, I think..."

As he was talking, he scanned the alien again, puzzled by how different, how oddly healthy he looked, and in no more than a few hours. The feverish flush still darkened his cheeks and nose, and gave his eyes an odd sunken look, but the tint was pale, half the intensity it had been before. The thermal pack over his eye was gone, and the bruises running up both sides of his face had faded to a dull, awful brownish color. His implants, formerly nigh-invisible against the pale pinkish-violet of his skin, had both dropped and climbed in brilliance, alternately glowing and drawing dark shadows in delicate formations through his flesh. His eyes, without the swelling sealing the one closed, were just as captivating as before, perhaps moreso now that both eyes were visible, and he had to look away before he lost himself in them again.

The quarian- Thie, he reminded himself, he had a name- held himself with impeccable posture, or as impeccable as he could make it, with the numerous casts and bandages hindering each movement. Though he leaned heavily on the glass to keep weight off of his injured ribs and muscles, and though one leg and half of one arm was swathed in a cast meant for a cracked carapace instead of broken bones, when and where he could he had his back straight, his chin up and his feet planted at shoulder-width. He gave off an air of alertness and of confidence, a bizarre subversion of the way he'd looked when Axilus had first encountered him curled up in a shivering ball in the corner of a dark and dank cell. Half a day of rest and he was already back in good condition. Axilus found himself wondering if the implants he'd caught sight and wind of had something to do with it; the doctors had mentioned he'd been a bit more cybernetically modified than they were comfortable with...

The quarian was watching him, too, he realized as he snapped out of his daze, and he straightened up quickly and tried to compose himself. "You were hardly alive the last time I checked on you. Got better quick." Lame, lame, _lame_! So much for being cool.

"So?" The alien shrugged.

"So, the doctors said they weren't sure if you were going to survive." Axilus crossed his arms. "Said you had all sorts of shit wrong with you, and a double-bad immune system on top of it. And then you beat everything they diagnosed you with in less than a day." Oh, he knew how he could stall! "Which is odd, don't you think? I gave you answers, now it's time you give me some."

The quarian snorted, folded his arms and leaned one shoulder against the glass. "You really think I'm going to talk to some kid I don't even know? How old are you, anyway?" He looked so human, it was creepy, with the way one of the fuzzy things on his face arched and the other furrowed, and that oh-so-human smirk on his lips. And it was pissing him off.

"Old enough to know when you're avoiding the question," he shot back. "You're hiding something, aren't you? Dunno why, I mean, your life rests on our hands, and we could check your background with the Migrant Fleet any time we wanted, but we're giving you a chance anyway, so..." He shrugged, flaring his mandibles in a smirk when he saw the quarian tense and frown. "Why don't you just tell me why the fuck you recovered so fast? I mean, I know you quarians augment yourselves like fuckin' crazy- how much of you is machine, anyway?- but most quarians don't do _nothing_ like what you had to do to regen like a fuckin' _krogan_. And with a shit immune system, too. How'd you do it? Got some secrets to share?"

"Look," the quarian finally snapped, slamming his unbandaged hand into the glass separating them so hard it made Axilus jump, "I just got away from a company of slavers that wanted to sell me into slavery after beating the hell out of me and nearly killing me. Then I woke up to a bunch of doctors doing... doing... something to me, and it felt like they were ripping my skin off and sewing me back into it until they knocked me out cold for fuck knows how long. And then I woke up in a sealed room, all of my clothes gone and replaced with a _dress_ that doesn't even _fit_ me, the only company being an _idiotic turian kid_ who _refuses_ to get the picture, with no idea how I got here or why I'm even here. All I know is, you're keeping me prisoner in here, _completely_ reliant on you and whoever the hell you work for because you took away my suit and all I've got keeping me from breathing unfiltered air- which could _kill_ me, mind you- is a damned _oxygen mask_ , and to be quite honest, I don't even know if you actually rescued me or if you just took me and plan to sell me off again in better condition than those slaver bosh'tets, and I just want to finish my Pilgrimage like I _intended_ to before this whole fiasco and go home. So _excuse me_ if I don't feel like playing Twenty Questions with you. Now would you kindly _fuck off_ and leave me _alone_!"

Axilus was quiet as the quarian turned and awkwardly stomped back to the small medical cot he'd been provided, plopping down with an irritated huff.

Things were silent for a tense minute.

Then Axilus sighed and leaned his forehead against the glass. "Sorry, didn't think of it that way." And he hadn't. He hadn't considered the fact that the quarian was very obviously uncomfortable, and he sure as hell hadn't considered that they'd practically torn him out of one bad situation and stuck him in another, as far as he was concerned.

Well, they'd never said he was smart, and this just proved it. Axilus Madelivio just managed to majorly fuck up something else. Wouldn't Dad be proud.

No, he wasn't going to let it go this way. He'd saved this damn quarian himself, and he'd be damned if his own stupidity fucked up a chance to make friends with someone that, now that he thought about it, probably didn't have much for friends. Weren't rescuers supposed to make friends with their rescuees, not enemies, anyway?

"Let's try this again." He stepped back and assumed the standard Proper Soldier position. Maybe he could make a better impression the second time around. And this time, he'd do it right. "I'm Axilus Madelivio, and welcome to the HSV Anchrivos."


	5. We Hope You've Enjoyed Your Stay in the Medbay, Don't Hurry Back

It was a week and a half before the doctor finally cleared Thie to leave the medbay.

His suit had come in two days after they'd requisitioned it, along with a care package from the Olyna and a credit chit with a surprisingly generous amount of credits on it (and he found himself wondering where the credits had come from, considering the quarian dislike for currency, though he eventually elected to ignore it and simply appreciate the gift). The suit was a perfect replica of the first, even down to the worn patch on the right forearm and the mods he'd installed to help moderate the static discharges that came with being biotic, and as he dressed, Thie felt himself becoming nostalgic for home.

It got worse when the turian doctors fussed about him, though. He quickly learned that the turians didn't like having a quarian onboard, and were in fact quite anxious to make him better so they could throw him back out on his own, and so whenever he showed the slightest indication of not feeling 100%, they swarmed him until he felt better.

Awkward.

He wasn't even allowed to leave the medbay for the longest time (not that he could have made it very far with his leg sealed in a medical boot and his arm casted up the way it was, but that was unimportant), instead setting up a makeshift home in the corner with extra sheets and rods just like he would back on the flotilla. Everyone left him alone, aside from the turian trainee and the krogan who called himself Gurdnau Crux; apparently somewhere along the ride on the slaver ship, Crux had decided he liked Thie quite a bit and had designated himself his bodyguard. For a while, he'd camped right outside Thie's little hutch, intent on keeping all the nosy turians away from the recovering quarian.

That caused a problem the first time the turian he'd met when he'd first awakened tried to visit. There was still a dent in the wall panel to the right of Thie's bed where Crux had decided to take action-- he'd tackled the kid hard enough to slam him into the wall with considerable force, knocked the poor guy out cold for ten minutes. Thie hadn't known whether to call for reinforcements or die laughing, and had ended up doing both at once, which hurt, but it was damn worth it, and he found himself wishing he'd had advance notice so he could have caught it with his omni-tool. Ah, well.

But after Crux had been moved to another bay for recovery, to which the krogan had strongly protested, the kid soldier, Axilus, had made stopping by a habit, and Thie wasn't quite sure of his feelings towards that little fact.

The turian was company, which was a good thing when you were alone for most of the day. But all he did was talk endlessly, chattering on about this or that, repeating the same stories over and over and laughing at his own jokes far too often. Thie was sure he'd heard the story of the time he'd met the Spectre Nihlus Kryik six times in the first two days, and all Axilus talked about after the first rendition of the story was about how cool the Spectre was, and how one day, he wanted to be a Spectre, and on and on and on. Thie had tuned him out after the first ten minutes, which turned out to be a mistake when he came to again and realized Axilus had asked him a question, only to find himself wholly unable to answer. Axilus hadn't held it against him, but he'd felt surprisingly bad for it.

Axilus had been there when his suit and care package had been delivered on that second day, and the whole time Thie was struggling his way into it, he'd kept up the constant stream of inane questions, pointless observations, and random statements and stories Thie had gotten used to, offering, to his surprise, help when the cast on his leg hindered his efforts to put on the lower portion of his suit.

Surprisingly, though, the chatter stopped the moment Thie began to put on his headpiece. Surprised, he'd glanced back at Axilus, convinced he'd somehow blown a circuit with his incessant blathering, and found him gaping instead.

"What?" he'd asked, more than a little disconcerted by the way the turian had just... stopped. And the turian hadn't answered, not until he'd refitted the mask over his face, heard the satisfying _pshht_ of the seal engaging and the CO 2 scrubbers activating, and felt the jittery uncertainty of being outside of his suit fade as the familiar slightly stale scent of filtered air filled his senses.

"I didn't realize so much went into it," Axilus lamely explained after Thie had finished, his mandibles fluttering in some turian expression he couldn't read. "I mean, I knew you needed the suits and all, but I didn't really know how, y'know, intensive it was..."

Thie had a feeling that wasn't how he really felt, but he'd dropped it there.

The turian hadn't stopped coming in to visit after that- in fact, he seemed to be visiting even more- and he seemed to be more and more comfortable with it now, coming in more frequently, plopping down on the end of his bed and chattering away about things Thie couldn't care less about. His presence became another constant in Thie's suddenly-hectic life.

And, oddly, Thie was comforted by it.

The turian wasn't smart, not by a long shot. He was strong, and he'd mentioned during one of their later conversations that Thie had played a part in activating his biotics, and Thie supposed that made up for what he lacked in the intelligence department. But despite his inability to understand things that weren't given or said to him straight, and despite his apparent lack of understanding of social conventions, he was good company, and as time passed, Thie found himself enjoying his presence more and more, to the point of actually missing him on the occasions he wasn't present. Something about the turian reminded him of the flotilla, and being around him relieved the constant stress building up the longer he was kept locked up. It pissed him off that the doctors insisted on keeping him caged up until they were sure he wouldn't cause trouble.

It made being released from the medbay that much sweeter.

Walking again was a challenge. Something had gone wrong with the mobility implants in his legs sometime during the assault, and doing much more than keeping upright was made difficult as the metal joints ground and complained and resisted his every movement. It was made only worse by the fact that one leg was still encased in a sealed medical boot, and the turian latched onto his side didn't help matters even when he did try to assist. But, refusing to allow the damn turians to trap him in the medbay even longer, he made it work. And, to their credit, they did provide him a pair of crutches after the first couple false starts made it (literally) painfully clear that he needed them, so at least he had that on his side. Plus, the turian, Axilus, was there to help him back up if he slipped or if his implants decided to go rigid and send him crashing down, so that was convenient.

The first thing he did once he escaped the medbay was retreat down to the cargo bay with his omnitool, refusing to allow even Axilus to remain nearby as he called up the comm and sent a message out to his parents to assure them of his wellbeing.

His parents were pretty laid back. They knew he could handle himself, and they'd been quite confident in his chances when he'd set out on his Pilgrimage, sending him off with a wave and a smile and a promise that he'd do great things and they just knew he'd find the perfect thing to bring back. He needed to make sure they knew he was okay; who knew what sort of message the turians had sent out? For all he knew, they thought he was on death's doorstep, which, though he may have been a while ago, he certainly wasn't anymore, and they ought to be the first to know.

Then he sent a message out to his shipmate, a quarian he'd set out on Pilgrimage in the company of and who had been left behind following the slaver attack on the colony they'd stopped on for supplies and information. The other quarian, a peppy young mechanic by the name of Kel'Raanis nar Anaid, had been lucky enough to be buried deep in the bowels of their patchworked freighter, struggling to kick some life back into its dying drive core, when the slavers had struck, and the first time Thie had checked his omnitool, he'd been met with literally hundreds of increasingly-frantic messages begging him to come back. The poor guy deserved to know he wasn't rotting in some dank brig anymore..

_/It's Thie. Still alive. Slavers tried damn hard to kill me. Fine now. Just got released from turian medbay. Drive core responding yet? I need pickup. Respond ASAP./_

Kel responded almost the second the message had finished sending, the sudden happy little _ding!_ nearly scaring Thie out of his suit for a split second.

_/THIE! Worried the slavers killed you, or worse! Should have commed me sooner, you bosh'tet, do you know how worried I was? Got the drive core working again thanks to the locals- humans ARE good for something! Even picked up a crew. Or, crew picked me. This krogan wouldn't take 'no' for an answer. Staring at me all creepy now from the copilot's seat. Maybe I shouldn't be talking out loud as I type. Send me your coordinates and I'll swing by. So glad you're okay!/_

Thie cracked a smile at the other quarian's overly-enthusiastic tone, attaching the ship's current coordinates along with a reminder that they probably wouldn't let him just walk off, then closed his messages, shut off his omnitool, and struggled to stand up again.

The turian showed up right after he fell for a third time, listening quietly to his frustrated cursing in Khelish for a moment before drawling, "Need some help?"

Thie froze and growled a little, struggling to situate one of the crutches under him while boosting himself up with his free hand only to collapse again with a pained grunt. "Oof!- No. I don't need your help," he spat, eyes narrowing behind the polarized glass of his mask at the visibly-smirking turian across the hold. "I can get up just fine by myself. Didn't I tell you to leave me alone?"

"Yeah, but it's pretty obvious you need my help now." Axilus heaved himself off the crate he'd been resting on and crossed the hold to stand at Thie's elbow, giving him a pointed look. "Or do you plan to keep falling over and cursing everything but your own stubbornness for it for another twenty minutes before you admit it?"

Thie huffed. Tried again. Failed. And huffed louder, glaring sulkily at the floor panels right in front of him. "Fine. Help me up. But be _gentle_ , I'm still sore as hell."

Axilus flared his mandibles in a turian grin, stooping down and- surprisingly gently for something as pointy as a turian- taking hold of his elbow, escorting him to his feet. When Thie almost fell, he grabbed him about the shoulders and by the arm, almost embracing him in his frantic attempt to keep him upright. When he realized what a position that put them in, he let go so quickly, Thie hardly had time to get his crutches beneath him before he fell again. "Uh- better?"

It took a moment for Thie to get his bearings, situating the crutches so that they held his weight off his bad leg without putting too much pressure under his arms. Then he nodded shortly, and started making his way towards the elevator- and how thankful he was for an elevator. If there had been stairs, he'd probably have killed himself trying to scoot up them to avoid the damn turian's cheeky offer to carry him up. Anything to keep the turian from getting what he wanted. "Where's the mess hall?"

"You hungry?" Axilus trotted after him, poking the option for the third deck once they both arrived in the elevator and leaning back against the back wall of it when the doors slid shut. "Can quarians even _eat_ turian food?" He sounded genuinely mystified, and Thie gritted his teeth to keep a biting remark from slipping out. "I mean, with those masks? And your immune systems? And, I mean, yours is even worse than the average quarian, according to the doc, so... And," Thie groaned, realizing the idiot wasn't done yet, "how would you even _eat_? I mean, turian food isn't paste like- like what you quarians _usually_ eat, it's _real food_. And obviously you need that mask, because quarian immune systems suck, and they say breathing any unfiltered air can, like, kill you if you aren't careful, and I don't see any convenient hatches or- or flaps or anything that you could shove food through- unless you have a tube or something, and we have to stick the food in a blender." The turian's mandibles clacked against the plating along his jaw, presumably in an expression of either disgust or disturbance. "So, if there's nothing to get the food through, how are you gonna even eat? Unless, y'know, you plan on taking the mask off, which sorta ruins the purpose of having it anyway, or maybe we really do have to stick it in a blender. Which I hope we don't. That'd be gross."

He waited for the waterfall of words to cease, then sighed. Just start from the beginning of the mess. "Yes, I _can_ eat turian food. I have implants to supplement my immune system; why do you think I recovered from the infection so quickly?" Well, he hadn't really recovered- he was still feverish, and his head still felt a bit foggy, but it was nothing compared to how he had felt- but the turian didn't need to know that. "And I _was_ planning on taking my mask off to eat. It might be bad for my health, but hell, so is starving to death, so I'll just have to deal with getting a little sick. I haven't eaten for..." How long had it been? He'd been unconscious or delirious for most of the time after the slavers had snatched him up, which made measuring time harder than fixing a drive core, blindfolded, while it was exploding. He thought back to the timestamps on Kel's messages, which had conveniently started the day he'd been dragged off and ended only a few minutes ago, and shrugged. "... a week? Maybe a day short of a week?" Close enough. "I don't know about you, but I'd rather deal with feeling off than starving."

"True." The turian considered, then shrugged and nodded. "All right, works for me. 'S long as you're okay with getting sick, I guess. Not my business." And then he went blissfully silent, and an awkward quiet descended over the elevator cabin.

Thie, however, was quite happy with the sudden silence. For the first time in ten minutes, he could think without having a loud, mildly annoying voice interrupting his every thought, and he, without particularly meaning to, used the lapse in the turian's endless tittering to observe his newfound, self-proclaimed 'best friend'. He was tall, almost ridiculously so, and a touch lankier than the other turian's he'd caught sight of, even with the added buff provided by his slightly-damaged heavy armor. His plates were a deep reddish brown and his eyes, half-lidded and lazy, were an odd blue-gray surrounded by the sharp, luminescent white curves that made up his facepaint, practically glowing against his dark hide. The way he held himself reminded Thie too much of Kel; his arms were loosely crossed in front of him, his shoulders relaxed and ever so slightly hunched inward where his upper back pressed into the wall of the elevator. To Thie, most turians looked identical, but this one looked so much younger, so much more laid back than the images which came to mind when he pictured a turian.

Axilus noticed him staring and spread his mandibles in an expression Thie had quickly learned just by virtue of sticking around this particular turian, a smile. "Like what you see?" he cheekily asked, cocking his head in what he presumed the young turian considered a suave manner.

It just made Thie laugh. Well, try to; he wasn't known for displays of emotion, so they came very hard to him, and all that came out of the laugh was a snort. He glanced away. "You look stupid."

"Thanks," he breezily replied, his tone still peppy as ever. He'd obviously picked up how Thie-speak worked in the short time they'd been around each other. "I mean, I did just get out of a _horrific_ test on my endurance by my _very_ -sadistic lieutenant and all, and apparently I don't look _that_ bad. That's a good thing."

"Test?"

"Oh yeah." Axilus shrugged, that turian smile growing wider. "Yeah, you probably don't remember, but on the slaver ship, you did this _awesome_ biotic explosion thing- gotta teach me that someday, let me tell you, that was fuckin' _amazing_ \- while you were lying in my arms, _literally_ maybe a foot away from my face, mind you, when you exploded like a living bomb, and the blast- thankfully it didn't _kill_ me, but it damn well _tried_ to- apparently triggered latent biotic abilities and all that scientific junk in me. Didn't even know I was exposed- to, to, what was it, eezo?- in the first place, but that doesn't matter. Anyway, so I get to the medbay, I'm feelin' all sorts of bad- my hands wouldn't stop shaking, I kept feeling like I was either going to throw up or- or explode, somehow, it was _horrible_ \- and the doc waltzes up with the LT and goes, 'You know what happened, you're a biotic now,' and I was like, 'no way!' and the LT goes, 'yes way,' and she's a biotic too, which I just found out, so after I got released- which, they treated me for _stress_ , of all things, said I'd pulled something in my brain or some shit with my biotic explosion, which I didn't even know I'd _done_ one- she dragged me into the cargo hold like, 'We're gonna train your biotics,' and I was like, 'Aw, what? I just got out of the medbay!' but she wouldn't hear it, nooo, and-"

The turian kept rambling on and on, but Thie tuned him out, switching off his audio receptors and reveling in the silence that followed. Though the company might be nice, the endless talking... well, that wasn't so much. He hadn't a moment of peace since the kid had decided to glue himself to his side except this, and he was determined to enjoy it.

His mind obviously didn't care what he wanted, for as soon as the turian's voice was cut off, his own inner voice started up. _"I kickstarted his biotic powers? Can that even happen?"_ he mused, thoughtfully biting the tip of his tongue. _"Maybe that's why he's glued himself to my side, refuses to go away for any amount of time. Or maybe the other turians assigned him to keep an eye on me. Damn them. They just had to pick the most annoying turian out there, didn't they?"_

His thoughts turned to another subject rather abruptly, and he bit down on the tip of his tongue, ignoring the sudden pulse of pain from the movement. _"I hope Kel gets here all right. Oh no- I hope they don't shoot him down or something. Damn turians, wouldn't put it past them. I did tell him they probably weren't going to let me go, right?"_ A bit of memory-searching later and that worry was banished. Kel knew how to handle himself.

Another worry quickly offered itself up to replace the first. _"Oh, Keelah, what am I going to do about my Pilgrimage? Getting around with a broken leg and arm, dealing with fucked-up mobility implants, recovering from a nasty infection and a fever, and on top of all that, now I've got a krogan loitering on the ship that I'll have to deal with, too. Don't know how I'm going to find something worthy of bringing back to the flotilla with all this going on."_ He sighed heavily and, careful his weight was still mainly on one crutch, he lifted one hand and pressed it to his helmet with another sigh. _"My Pilgrimage isn't going to go so well, is it. First our drive core craps out, then we have to land on a human colony to repair it, then we're hit by slavers, of all things, and now we've gained a krogan crew member when we can't even afford to support two quarians. We don't have the supplies to hit the Citadel, we don't have the fuel to make it to Illium... Is there anywhere in the galaxy that two down-on-their-luck quarians can find a decent job, even? Maybe bring along a stubborn krogan? 'Hey, don't mind us, just looking for work so we don't, y'know, die out in space of starvation or something. Go about your business.' No, probably not. Not unless we look real hard. Maybe we should go by Terminus."_ He sighed again and shook his head. _"Good thing I don't have a problem with being away from the flotilla, because I get the feeling we're going to be out here for a long time..."_

He was dragged out of his internal musings by a tap on the shoulder, and he jumped and reactivated his audio just in time to catch Axilus saying, "-elevator stopped, we can go now."

"Right, yes, of course." He hastily jammed the other crutch under his arm and began awkwardly limping out of the elevator, nearly falling when one crutch slipped on the smooth metal floor and almost sent him down. Axilus caught him in the nick of time, steadying him and placing the crutch back under him without comment. Thie's face burned, and he mumbled a quiet "thanks" before continuing to struggle his way down the corridor.

Luckily, the mess wasn't far. But it was just long enough that Thie's underarms had kicked up a mighty fuss by the time they arrived, and he slid thankfully into the seat that Axilus, without even being asked, pulled out, sighing in relief. "I hate using crutches," he grumbled, watching Axilus sidle through the group of turians clustered around the main kitchen-y area and start sorting through the contents of the cabinets. "They cause more pain than they're worth."

"Can't help that those're made for turians," Axilus commented, sifting through the cabinets with an amused ruffle of his mandibles. "Turians aren't soft like quarians, so we don't need padding or anything. Probably makes it pretty rough on something as soft as you."

"No kidding." Thie huffed and leaned forward, resting his chin on his hand and glaring back at the turians that were gaping at him like he was some escaped science experiment. Mask or no, the venom in his stare was enough to chase them off, and before long, the two of them were alone in the mess. "My underarms are going to be bruised as hell after this."

"Do your implants help heal bruising, too?"

"Why would they? They're not anti-flesh wound agents, they're immunoboosters."

Axilus made a face at him that he didn't recognize. "Well so-orry, princess. You quarians have so many cybernetics, how was I supposed to know what you had?"

"You ask." Thie made a face back, even though the turian couldn't see it.

"Oh, right, because that's not weird at all. 'Hey, um, excuse me,'" Axilus imitated a high falsetto, innocently batting his eyes, and Thie snorted, "'do you have implants that can heal minor flesh wounds? No? Aw, shoot, well thanks anyway!'" His voice dropped back to its normal baritone and he gave Thie a look that even he could recognize as exasperation. "Please."

It took all he had to hold back a snicker. "You have a point." Axilus rolled his eyes and went back to sifting through cabinets. Thie dramatically, and impatiently, drummed his fingers on the table. "Will you just pick something? At this point, I don't care what it is you give me, as long as it's edible and not liable to make me throw up."

"All right, fair enough." Axilus grabbed some package off the top shelf of the second to last cabinet and chucked it in Thie's general direction, turning around just in time to see Thie clumsily catch it in a haphazard biotic field and draw it to him. "You just use biotics all casual?"

"You sound surprised." Thie snatched the package out of the air, identifying it as some sort of energy bar, and began peeling back the thin, foil-like wrapper. "If you've got the biotics, why not use them?"

"Lieutenant Nieght says that's irresponsible."

"Lieutenant Nieght can kiss my ass." He carefully removed his mask, lying it beside him on the table before viciously attacking the energy bar. The flavor wasn't wonderful, but it was pure magic compared to the flavorless, textureless nutrient paste he was used to, and even though it had a texture similar to clumpy sand and greedily sapped the moisture from his mouth, he savored every bite.

Axilus watched him eat from the counter in the kitchen-area, that odd fascination filling his eyes again the second the mask came away. Thie made a mental note to confront him about it later. "... how long have you been a biotic? I mean 'able to use your powers' biotic, not 'my doctor says I'm special' biotic."

Thie swallowed a mouthful and shrugged. "As long as I can remember." He went for another bite, paused, and lowered the bar. "It's all I really can remember. I've had my biotics thrown in my face all my life. Hard being a faceless kid on the crew when everyone recognizes you and treats you like a monster because you've got powers none of them have seen in centuries."

Axilus looked surprised, but not very. "The quarians treat biotics like monsters?"

"Well, yeah." He gave the turian an odd look. "How many quarian biotics have you seen since we took to the stars and abandoned our home?" He didn't wait for an answer. "Being a quarian biotic means you killed your mother during childbirth because your birth was too damn stressful. You eat more, you sleep more, you run out of energy too fast. You can't be around engines because you attract static energy like a magnet, and in their minds, the slightest discharge could cause a disaster. You don't know how to control your powers because there's no one around to teach you, and no one to realize you didn't intentionally blow out that bulkhead or break that guy's back, you just didn't know how not to. You blow through suit seals like they're nothing because of the static and because of the energy you're constantly giving off, and you're treated like a leech for needing suit repairs ten times as often as everyone else." He leaned forward, trying to keep his tone even and failing horribly. "You are a mistake, you weren't meant to exist, and now that you do, everyone's too scared of you to make use of you. All they want to do is send you off and hope they never see you again. They treat you worse than a monster. Like a nightmare. They want to open their eyes and believe you never existed."

Axilus was quiet for a minute. "... that's how turians are, too. Turians don't trust biotics."

"Then you understand."

"You know what I understand? I understand my military career is fucked. I understand I'm never going to see battle because they won't let me train my powers up, they're just going to stick me in some back-rank Cabal unit until my years are up and they can order me to go home." He shook his head, mandibles clacking against his jaw plates. "I thought the Cabals were so cool as a kid. Then I grew up and found out that being stuck in one isn't going to be all I thought it'd be cracked up to be, and worse, I have no choice in the matter."

Thie was quiet for a moment. "... I wish I'd never found out about my powers, too."

"Too late for both of us, huh?" The turian gave a dry laugh, and Thie returned it with a sigh and a nod.

"Yeah. A little."

They were silent for a few minutes. Thie quietly resumed eating. Axilus shifted position to get more comfortable, drawing one hand up and resting it idly on his cowl. But the silence wasn't as uncomfortable as it should have been. Then the comm buzzed.

_"Axilus Madelivio and quarian guest, report to the captain's office immediately."_

They exchanged a look. Axilus fluttered his mandibles, and Thie sighed and refitted his mask before attempting to stand again, slipping the crutches under his arms as the turian rounded the table to help him up. "Captain's office, huh?" He smiled a dry, humorless smile. "This ought to be fun."


	6. "It's Nothing Personal", They Always Say

_"This_ is your biotic?" The turian sitting behind the desk, apparently a Commander Leitam Adanis according to the placard on the door, looked distinctly unimpressed, even to Thie. He might have had almost no experience reading turian expressions before, but what little exposure he'd had over the past week and a half granted him the ability to be quite cowed by the venom radiating from the officer's leer. "Lieutenant Commander, you do realize quarians can't be biotics, right?"

"I'm well aware there are no recently documented cases of quarian biotics, yes, Commander." He hadn't known the woman could be so calm. She stood with her back straight, chin up, and arms neatly crossed behind her back, and her voice was even more level than it had been when they'd first met. The only outward indication that the whole situation was quickly getting on her nerves was a slight tension in her mandibles, nothing more. Thie envied her. She certainly had impressive control of her emotions.

"And you know the consequences for falsifying a report, correct?"

"Of course, sir."

He studied her, face impassive. Axilus shifted anxiously at Thie's side, trying to remain at attention and peer out of the corner of his eye at Lieutenant Caheen at the same time. He was horrible at subtlety, so Thie elbowed him in warning and, thankfully, he fell still.

The commander's mandibles pulled in flush against his skin, and he leaned back ever so slightly. Beside Thie, the woman breathed a quiet sigh of relief. "Have you sent word to anyone else yet?"

"No, sir."

"Good."

The turian sat back, arms crossed lazily before him, and he stared appraisingly at Thie, who attempted to draw himself to his full height despite the screaming pain as his weight came off the crutches and bore down fully on his injured leg. "All right then, Nieght. If you're going to claim that this disaster of a training mission was worth the scientific revelation that would be the discovery of a quarian biotic, I need proof. I won't accept the loss of so many talented recruits so blindly."

"I didn't expect that you would, sir. What can we do to convince you?"

"I want to see him use his biotics." The turian steepled his fingers. "Here and now."

"What?"

Thie stiffened. To his other side, Axilus drew in a quick breath, clamping his mandibles tight to his jaw. There was a brief silence. Then Lieutenant Nieght turned to him suddenly, nodding. Her expression was carefully clear. "Thie'Haasn, please demonstrate your biotics for Commander Adanis. But try not to break anything."

Thie blinked. They stared at each other for a moment, and Thie did his best to burn her through with his best glare. She wasn't fazed. Impressive. Then he blinked again and looked from her to the cramped office they stood in before turning his gaze to the commander and giving him an incredulous look. "You really want me to use my biotics here?"

Commander Adanis laced his fingers together, resting his chin on his hands. "If you want to convince me you were worth the expense, you will."

"You realize biotics can _seriously_ fuck up the room, right?"

"I expect you'll restrain yourself just fine."

Thie shot the turian a dirty look through his mask. Great. They expected him to demonstrate his biotics in a tiny, closed-in box, surrounded by turians that could very easily rip his suit apart with one false move who, knowing his luck, would be easily startled, and now he was pretty sure the senior officer sitting expectantly before him was going to hold him accountable for any damages that might result from this stupid test.

Fuck his life.

With a huff, Thie took a step back from the others to give himself a bit of room, closing his eyes. Focusing on using his biotics was easy; he'd had plenty of practice. He was confident in his abilities to restrain himself, but then again, he _was_ exhausted from everything that had happened, and he _was_ still feeling feverish. And if that wasn't bad enough, his implant had been acting oddly ever since he'd first woke up in the turian medbay.

Man, if he had a choice, he wouldn't be in this situation. He would be back on the freighter with Kel, listening to him yammer on about something he had no interest in, drifting aimlessly through system after system in an attempt to think of a way to complete his Pilgrimage. He wouldn't have been kidnapped by slavers, he wouldn't have nearly died, he wouldn't have been rescued by a bunch of damn turians who thought they were so much better than him, and he wouldn't have ended up with a krogan bodyguard who'd had to be sedated and dragged to a containment cell so that he could be forced to stand here and listen to a turian who didn't give half a shit about him prattle on about scientific revelations and racist bullshit.

Calm down, Thie. He needed to focus.

His implant protested his attempts to jar it to life, starting up a raging burn which quickly developed into something which felt very similar to a hot knife jabbing against his flesh. He did his best to ignore it regardless. The energy collected and burned hot tracks down his arms and up behind his eyes, his fingers tingled, and then all too quickly, it erupted into a flash of roaring pain and just as suddenly dampened to nothing. All that remained was a dull throb at the base of his skull and a numbing fog of hurt which settled over his entire body like a smothering blanket.

He opened his eyes.

The blur of light and color which danced before him was disorienting. Voices faded in and out of his ears, half of them clearly gibberish and the rest muffled and impossible to decipher. The light made the throbbing in his head grow into an agonizing pulse, each wave striking like a knife to his temples.

He closed his eyes and reveled in the void it brought.

The world fell blissfully silent. Nothingness wrapped around him and pulled him further from the painful light and sound, and he didn't resist.

He floated.

For once, his body didn't hurt. Nothing did.

Ages later, or so it felt, something caught.

He came to slowly, immediately aware of a dull, throbbing ache in his leg and a painful weight on his chest. His eyes felt gummed shut, and he didn't have the energy to fight them open.

_Beep. Beep. Beep._

Rustling somewhere near his feet, slightly to the left. Something touched the injection port on his left arm. A prick of pain and he came flooding back all at once.

"Easy there," said a friendly voice, catching him as he gasped and jolted upright. He immediately regretted it and bit back a pained moan, pressing a hand to his mask as if it would relieve the sudden incessant throbbing behind his eyes. It felt like someone had poured liquid agony into his skull. The voice spoke again, and a hand touched his back. "You feeling better?"

He couldn't speak, groaning in response.

The voice seemed sympathetic. "You took quite a beating on that ship, didn't you?" Thie groaned again and carefully shook his head, thankful when some of the fogginess began dispersing. Now he could identify the voice as turian, and silently cursed the fact that he'd woken up in yet another turian medbay. Fate had it out for him, apparently.

Oh lord, he felt sick. He put his head between his knees.

Once he felt a little less like death and a little more like he could handle being alive, he shook his head once more, blinked rapidly, and turned his head to stare at the turian nurse perched at his side before surveying his surroundings. Yep, definitely a turian medbay. This one looked well-stocked, though. Must still be on the station. The turian continued as he took in the medbay, "Lieutenant Commander Nieght told me you passed out in the commander's office when you tried to use your biotics. Can't say I'm surprised; you haven't been sleeping, have you?"

Thie hesitated, looking back at the nurse. The nurse paused, waiting for a response, and Thie grudgingly nodded. "Can't. Too quiet." Not the truth, but it'd do. And it wasn't necessarily a lie. A quiet ship like the turian training ship would have any quarian on edge; back on the fleet, ships only ran quiet when something had gone catastrophically wrong, like a drive core malfunction or a ventilation failure. Most other species accepted quarians not being able to sleep in quiet environments after they heard the reason for it. Maybe this nurse would just think he was being a typical quarian in that way.

Unfortunately, he didn't look convinced, but Thie was able to breathe a sigh of relief when he didn't press him. "I could tell. Well, you _definitely_ caught up on your sleep here. Twelve hours and change." Thie gave a surprised start, and the nurse chuckled. "Welcome back to the world."

Then his expression turned serious. "The other reason you passed out was a nasty malfunction in your implant. Your friend told me the story about the slaver vessel, and it looks like their rough treatment might have rattled your implant around a little. When you tried to power up, it overloaded and knocked you senseless. Lucky you didn't give yourself brain damage. We did what we could for it, but your best bet will be to keep your biotics offline for a little bit. Let it settle down and work out its issues, or you might end up doing yourself in. The spirits of fortune only bless you for so long."

Thie sucked in a breath and nodded slowly. "Right. Works for me."

Well, that sucked. Now, not only was he stuck on a turian station in the middle of turian space with no idea how close Kel was to getting him out, or even if he'd be _able_ to, but his biotics were fucked up, too. There went his primary defense. Briefly he wondered if he could copy someone's defense turret program as a temporary backup. If he remembered right, Kel had been gifted a pretty good one right before they'd parted for Pilgrimage.

The nurse began speaking again and motioning to Thie's leg, and when he looked down Thie immediately realized why his leg ached. "We took the liberty of re-setting the bones in your arm and leg while you were unconscious, and we had a few medical boots and casts left sitting around from the humans that stopped by a couple weeks ago, so we got rid of the carapace casts and the other boot and refitted you with those. A couple of alterations and they worked perfectly. You _should_ be able to get around without crutches now."

Thie blinked down at the delicate plastic and metal device wrapped tightly but comfortably around his bad leg, its glittering silver surface ending just below his knee. Metal stress rods stretched from the braces latched around the top of the silver and the cloth straps cinched right above his knee and reached all the way down to his foot, which was safely tucked into a distinctly human-looking boot. It was surprisingly comfortable, and he could see seals linking it to his envirosuit's systems and shielding it from the outside world. Surprising, but he was impressed a turian medical group had managed to do so well for a species they'd probably rarely seen before. He carefully bent his leg, testing the strain of the material against his leg and the dull burn that came from deep beneath the silver casing, then swung both legs over the edge of the medical cot and, very carefully, stood.

He wobbled only slightly as the exhaustion punched him in the equilibrium once more and caught himself. The boot held. He found himself quite impressed by the design. The stress rods carried his weight from his knee and directly to the floor, and the straps wrapped securely around his knee gave him some much-needed stability, keeping his damn knee from buckling like it seemed to like to now. And he didn't need crutches. Praise the ancestors.

His arm, meanwhile, was in a slightly itchy cast (which he gave an irritated glare) that reached nearly to his armpit, and it rested in a cloth sling draped around his neck, his fingers hanging limp at about the middle of his chest. While it was certainly better than the turian cast he'd had, he wasn't quite sure if he approved of the small range of mobility granted by the bulky material. At least it didn't weigh a ton.

The medic beamed at him. "Good as new. Now, if I remember right, the rookie who brought you in requested I send you to the mess after you woke up. One Axilus Madelivio?"

Thie blinked and waited for him to go on, but the turian didn't. All of a sudden, he recalled where he was and scrambled for an answer, eventually settling for a simple nod once he figured out his voice didn't plan on working.

Right, he'd entirely forgotten that he was aboard a turian station and not back on the flotilla. People evidently weren't quite so chatty here as they were back home, where you only got a word in once the other person had decided they were finished speaking instead of taking turns like the rest of the galaxy, and he had to remember that they weren't used to quarian body language. The mute thing he'd been used to wasn't going to work here.

The turian medic, however, was unfazed, and cheerily pointed towards one of the several doors leading into the medbay. "Right, you'll want to go out that door and down the hall, take the first right, head up the first flight of stairs you see, head right, and turn left at the second junction. The mess is the third door on the left. You can't miss it."

"Uh- yes, thank you." Thie settled for a slight bow, then hurried for the door. Something about being around all these turians just made him feel all skeevy. And while he had a distinct feeling the mess wasn't going to be much better, it _had_ to be less awkward than standing there letting a medic chat you to death.

Maybe.

Hopefully.

God, why did it have to be _him_ that got into this mess? Why not a quarian with _social skills_ instead of the _one_ quarian who had _no idea_ how to carry on a proper conversation? Just his luck.

He'd never been terrific around people; growing up the bane of society had that effect on you. But with quarians, he was a little more comfortable, because he knew their customs and he knew how to read their body language and intonation well enough to carry on a decent conversation. He could fake knowing what to do and how to do it because he'd grown up doing it. And with most quarians, he didn't even have to speak. No, he could rely on nonverbal signals like body language and be just as understood as if he'd been chattering along with them. He'd even gone three weeks once without saying a word.

But here, he had no idea how to function socially. Turians didn't have facial expressions like everyone else; sure, you could read the movement of their brow plates like you could eyebrows, and some expressions carried over between species without a problem. He knew that tense mandibles meant bad things and loose meant good, just like it did with quarian body language. He'd learned from Axilus that spreading both mandibles and cocking them slightly upward was a smile. Clacking the mandibles against the plates of their jaw indicated disapproval. He knew that much. But beyond that, he was clueless.

And he didn't even want to _think_ about the whole subvocals thing. To think, an entire communication channel conveying emotions and opinions and reactions with 100% honesty, and he couldn't hear it. Sure, he could hear the faint humming underneath their voices, could hear how the tones fluctuated and formed words that weren't words just out of earshot. Everyone knew they were there. The flanging tones were an integral part of the turian identity in galactic society, an easy way to tell them apart from humans and asari using only their voices. He also knew that subvocals were the turian Achilles Heel in that lying through them was very nearly impossible, which made them exceedingly invaluable when conversing with turians, and it positively infuriated Thie that he had absolutely no idea how to read the tones, or even how to simply make them audible. He had a feeling trying to would go about as well as wooing a raging krogan.

He froze and shuddered suddenly, grimacing.

Oh Keelah. Why did he have to put that image in his own head? That was going to haunt his nightmares.

He was still scrubbing the memory away when he stepped into the mess hall, grateful for once when nobody acknowledged him. Aboard the flotilla, it would have either hurt or pissed him off, but now, he was just thankful he wasn't being gawked at like a rogue science experiment.

Which, he realized, he very well might be soon if those turians had anything to say about it.

Maybe it was a good thing he couldn't summon his biotics for Commander Adanis.

He was jolted from his thoughts and saved from awkwardly wandering the crowded cantina by a very familiar voice calling his name from across the (needlessly large, they could have fit a hundred shacks in the cafeteria portion alone had this ship been at the flotilla) mess hall.

"Thie! Hey, over here!" Axilus was waving painfully hard, his entire upper body swaying from the force he was projecting into the motion. Surrounding him was one familiar krogan with a gunmetal blue hide- Crux- and another krogan he didn't recognize with murky brown hide and more scars and tears in his lips than Thie was comfortable with- which, he realized, must have been the one Kel had picked up. Sitting nearby, but not engaged with them in any way, sat a cluster of vaguely familiar turians in armor very similar to the style Axilus wore. After a minute or two of thinking, he placed them as the rest of the trainee squad that had boarded the slaver ship. There weren't many, and he found himself wondering just how many they'd lost. He hadn't been in any position to count them when they'd come across him in the depths of that nightmare.

Picking his way across the hall (he wasn't a fan of drawing attention to himself, never had been and never would be), Thie made his way to the group, crossing his arms once he was within hearing range. "Remember that, Madelivio." Calling him by his first name just felt far too familiar, and Thie wasn't one to get familiar with people he wasn't sure about. Which was odd, because he was on a first-name basis with Kel when he'd only known him for about two months, but he pushed that off as an exception. "Don't overuse your biotics or you'll pass out and make a fool of yourself."

"I don't think you made a fool of yourself." Axilus sat back with an easy grin, one mandible cocked up and the other loose. "Scared the bejeesus out of me and the LT, though. I don't think the commander's going to ask you to demonstrate your biotics again."

"Good." With a bit of effort, Thie maneuvered himself into one of the uncomfortable mess chairs, immediately noting that it was definitely made to suit turian physiology. He made the mistake of leaning back once, then chose to spend the rest of his time hunched forward, injured arm hanging limp against his chest and good arm propping his head up. He nodded towards the unknown krogan. "Don't believe we've met."

The krogan grunted and dipped his head in what Thie recognized as a gesture of acknowledgement. Most krogan just blew him off, so this was a good sign. "Raik Gemeng. Just Raik, though. I take it you're the chatterbox's friend?"

Thie nodded, bowing his head in greeting. "Thie'Haasn nar Olyna. Kel mentioned you in his message. How do you like the ship?"

"It's a heap of scrap." The krogan- Raik- made a huffing sound and shook his head. "I've seen worse, but only in the scrapyard."

"It's all we've got. Where's Kel?"

Raik jerked his head in the general direction of the dock. "Turians jumped us the second we docked. Didn't want to let me go. Something about me being a security threat." He bared his teeth in what probably amounted to a krogan sneer. "Then some lady turian showed up. Took 'em all of ten seconds to decide we weren't worth the trouble. She wanted to talk to him. Said it might be a while before he can join us."

Thie frowned, leaning forward a bit. "Did she tell you why she wanted to see him? Anything? He isn't in trouble or something, is he?" Kel'Raanis might have been a good-natured kid with the social finesse of a con man, but he doubted he'd do very well against the lieutenant commander if something had gone wrong. He probably wouldn't have a clue how to handle it. Knowing the poor kid, he'd have a panic attack. It had happened before.

Suddenly, a thought occurred to him, and he just as suddenly wished it hadn't.

"She must be questioning him about the slaver raid," he realized aloud, and Axilus cringed and Crux stiffened, though Raik remained calm as ever. "Poor kid. He doesn't even know anything. He was with the drive core the whole time."

Raik shrugged, and Axilus cut in, his tone desperate as he tried to change the subject. "How about we don't talk about that? Cuz I'd be fine with never talking about it again. Hey, Thie, is that a new cast?"

"I wouldn't worry about him," Crux cut in. The edges of his mouth curved upwards in either a smile or a smirk, Thie couldn't tell, and he nodded towards Thie. "If he's anything like this little pyjak, he'll be fine."

"Come on, guys, can we talk about something else?"

"Is that a compliment?" Thie turned to Crux with a slight smile. His tone, usually flat and lacking greatly in inflection (which was part of why he had such trouble reading others, he presumed), lifted a little, and he dramatically puffed out his chest. "Unkillable, no matter what the galaxy throws at me. Biotics? Sure. Social rejection? Why not? Slavers? Not a problem."

"Guys, really, I don't think we ought to be-"

"Bahaha! Yes, indeed. You might actually be tough enough to pose a challenge."

"That's great, now can we please-"

"Is that a challenge, Gurdnau?"

"Oh spirits, please don't-"

"It is, Haasn. You chicken?"

"Can we just-"

"Where and when? It's not too late to back out if you're scared."

"You know what?" Axilus slammed his hands against the table, giving Thie a good start, and stood. His mandibles were fluttering in tight, obviously uncontrollable motions, and it was obvious Axilus was trying and failing to keep them tight against his cheeks. "Fuck it. I'm out." He turned, carefully detangled himself from the crowd, and vanished.

Thie watched him go, at the same time amused and a bit guilty. The guilt passed quickly as it always did, and he turned back to the two krogan. Raik's eyes, dark red like muted fire, were full of amusement. Crux's strident green held an unspoken challenge, yet without a trace of malice.

He felt no shame in what he was about to say.

Thie grinned cheekily and motioned to his arm. "Sorry, I'm injured. But I'll take you up on that offer later."

Crux huffed loudly and Raik cackled. What do you know, a krogan with a sense of humor. Those were growing rare nowadays. Seemed like most krogan either didn't have personalities or had personalities full of nothing but rage and hatred. It was nice to see a couple exceptions to the rule. "One day, Haasn," Crux promised, though his lips twisted into an odd smile. "We'll battle one day. I want to see what you can do."

"Challenging a krogan, are we, quarian?"

Thie almost jumped out of his suit for the millionth time and he twisted to glare at the origin of the new voice- one of the turian recruits he'd spotted earlier. He was a few inches shorter than Axilus, with tan plates highlighted by luminescent blue paint. Painful-looking scars ran up one half of his face and down into his collar, and he was missing a mandible. Beside him stood a female turian quite noticeably shorter, impossibly blue eyes peering out from beneath the hood obscuring most of her face. From what he could see, her plates were a dull, dark red, almost black, with bright red paint looping graciously beneath her eyes.

Thie blinked at them, searching his memory for names, or even for a match for their faces, and came up blank. "Do I know you?"

The male turian shook his head, offering a hand, though he withdrew it when Thie simply glared at him. "My name is Szarus Valerian, I was with Axilus when he found you in the cell. This," he said, gesturing to the female, "is Vreena Aelianus. She and Freiya Domitiana carried you to the medbay once we got to the ship."

The female smiled that odd turian smile he'd seen on Axilus's face so often and nodded. "Call me Vee. May we sit with you?"

Thie glanced back at the two krogan. Raik shrugged. Crux grunted. "Whatever."

With a polite nod to both krogan, Szarus took Axilus's seat, and Vreena- _Vee,_ he corrected himself- pulled a chair from the other table and sat in it backwards, resting her elbows on what was supposed to be the back of the chair. The woman looked intrigued. "I heard Szarus say you're a biotic." Her voice had an odd lilt he'd never heard before in a turian voice, like the accents so many humans had which rounded the ends of their words and dropped 'r's in all the wrong places. But it sounded natural, as if she'd grown up speaking with that odd accent, and he found himself wondering where she'd picked it up. It was weird. If it hadn't been for the flanging, he might have mistaken her for a very lost human. "I've never heard of a quarian biotic before."

"That's because they don't tend to make it past exposure," Thie breezily replied, carefully arranging his voice into one which demanded the subject be dropped, or else. She was unfazed, and continued on.

"So how did you?"

He wished Axilus was around to distract her. But then he recalled his failed attempt at redirecting the conversation between himself and Crux and thought better of it. Just where had he run off to, anyway? He knew it wasn't really any of his business, Axilus was a grown turian with his own life, but Thie couldn't help but feel a little angered by the way he'd just up and left without bothering to tell them where he was going. Something about it just peeved him.

No, no, relax. He was Thie'Haasn, and he wouldn't allow himself to be dragged around by his emotions like a dog on a chain. Reason it out.

Well, he'd been stressed, that much was obvious. And he'd seen several agitated turians exit the mess hall since he'd arrived, often in pairs. Turians made an awful big deal out of stress relief in the ring, so perhaps he'd pulled out with a buddy to go sparring? That's what _he_ would do to relieve stress if he'd been in fighting shape. Hmm. He'd have to ask. Certainly one of his friends would know.

But just as he resolved to question the two turian rookies so conveniently located at his table, Szarus butted in with his own addition to the conversation. His mandibles were tight against his jaw, occasionally fluttering a little, and after a moment Thie recognized it as either worry or exasperation. Something else to note down in the How To Read Turian Expressions handbook he'd been compiling in his head. Score. "Where did Axilus go? I thought he'd be with you. You're all he's talked about since you made it onboard."

That caught his attention. Well, the first part, anyway. The last part probably should have, too, but he was much more preoccupied with the fact that he'd been completely and entirely incorrect in his assumption that the other recruits knew what the hell Axilus had gotten himself into. Thie blinked and turned towards the male turian, brows furrowing. "You don't know?"

"No. He didn't say anything when he left?"

"You mean this _isn't_ normal behavior for a turian? Just up and vanishing the moment he's got a little stress?"

"Well, no." Szarus looked appalled.

But before either of them could speculate on exactly what the moron had gotten himself into, Vreena laughed and interjected with, "He's off with Freiya."

"What?" All four heads snapped to her, Thie's brow furrowing and Szarus's brow plates rising in realization.

"Oh, _right,"_ Szarus breathed, leaning back and slapping one taloned hand over his eyes. "I _completely_ forgot about that. No _wonder_ he excused himself."

"What?" Thie looked from one recruit to the other and back again, frustration soaring exponentially as neither immediately provided answers. Was this some turian custom or something he hadn't known about? Keeping information from the confused alien who just wanted answers? "What do you mean, he's with Freiya? What's going on, what don't I know?"

"Well, you see..." Szarus coughed awkwardly into his hand and gave Vreena a pleading look. The female turian sighed dramatically.

"Turians are all about stress relief," she began, mandibles spread in an expression he didn't quite realize. One extended out, while the other cocked downward, fluttering every once in a while. "The most popular methods of stress relief are working it out in the ring and working it out in _private,_ if you get my drift. And..." Her subvocals rose in pitch, and her voice took on a tint of amusement. "Well, let's just say that for being about as straight as a bareface, there's a reason he's the most laid-back of us all."

Oh no. Surely she didn't mean-

No. She did. He could see it in her eyes, and the eyes never lied.

Thie stared. Raik broke out into loud guffaws, while Crux simply stared at him with a disapproving frown. Szarus looked about ready to melt into the floor and disappear for the rest of his life, his face buried in his hands and mandibles fluttering madly in what Thie could only assume was secondhand embarrassment.

Thie was silent for a long time. Internally, he was fuming as the pieces slowly came together.

No wonder Axilus hadn't mentioned where he was going.

His rational mind whispered that it was none of his business, and there was no reason for him to be angry because Axilus had decided to take a friend to bed to work out some frustration. The irrational, enraged part of him quickly crushed it into the ground. He was offended and enraged and confused and hurt and despairing all at the same time, and what infuriated him wasn't that he was feeling things he'd never felt before, but that he couldn't quite figure out _why._

When he spoke again, his voice was a deadly monotone, all thought of bothering with inflection gone in an instant. It made Vreena burst into laughter as well, and made Szarus sink down further into his seat, unprotected skin on his throat flaring bright blue. Any other time, he'd have been fascinated with the display, but there were more important things to think about right now.

"He's fucking _dead."_

Like Axilus acting like a damned rutting animal.

God damn it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whee, my writing feels so awkward here.
> 
> This chapter and the next were originally supposed to be one chapter, but it got a little too long, so I had to split it into two. At least I finally had an idea for an update!


	7. (I Won't Say) I'm In Love: The Xenophilic SciFi Adventure

For being about as bad-tempered as an adolescent krogan, Thie was quite impressed with the amount of control he actually had over his display of emotions.

The other two recruits had left very quickly after Thie's revelation and subsequent freak-out, if you could even call it that (all he'd done was fume and biotically throw a few utensils at the wall, so what? Nobody had gotten hurt, and the wall had a few new decorations that really might not belong there.), and Crux had vanished off somewhere with the excuse of being hungry and certain the turians had levo rations _somewhere_. He and Raik were the only ones at the table when Axilus had decided to show up again, and aside from the slightly concerned glimmer in Raik's eye (or maybe he was just amused, this krogan seemed to be amused by just about everything Thie did), there was no evidence of Thie's (admittedly irrational, he'd yet to figure out exactly _why_ he wanted to rip Axilus apart for simply wanting to relieve a little stress) anger, all of it carefully hidden behind layer after layer of cool and calm.

"Have fun with Freiya?" he breezily asked as Axilus slid back into his seat, eyebrow twitching when the turian flinched. He almost dropped the cool façade, but brought the walls back up just in time.

"Well, uh..." Axilus fumbled for a reply. Thie noticed the way his mandibles were fluttering in short, quick bursts against his jaw, noting it down in his mental turian handbook. "H-how did you-?"

"How did I know?" Thie kept his voice carefully neutral and lifted one shoulder in a half-shrug, and even though he knew his mask hid his face, he forced the tension out of his jaw and arranged his face into his typical frown. "One of your friends stopped by. Mentioned you like to run off with her." He allowed his voice to take on a very slight accusatory tone. "To the bedroom."

The turian flinched.

Thie's temper flared, and he struggled to tamp it down and keep the anger and hurt out of his voice. He still hadn't quite figured out where that came from. Well, he sort of understood the anger, but the hurt he was feeling positively boggled him. "You know, you _could_ have mentioned you had a girlfriend."

"A _girlfriend?!"_ Axilus's eyes bugged and he stammered incoherently, flustered, for a response. "What the _fuck_ are you-"

"All those stories you told me," Thie cut in, scowling, "and not once did you mention you had a damn girlfriend. Didn't think it was important enough to mention, is that it? Having a girlfriend isn't important, but having seen a vid about someone you're never going to meet _is?"_

"No!" Axilus's mandibles dropped and angled outward ever so slightly, and his subvocals rose sharply in pitch. Was that the turian expression of shock? Or confusion? "I mean, _no,_ she's not my girlfriend! No, nonononono, you don't _understand-!"_

"Oh, I understand," he growled, unable to keep the reins in on his temper. Out of his periphery, he saw Raik grunt, stand, and retreat, a rather amused look in his eyes. The damn krogan's weird sense of humor would forever be an enigma to him. "I know how you turians are with your damn stress relief. You think _you're_ stressed? You think _you_ have it bad? _I'm_ the one who almost _died_ aboard that ship!"

"Yeah, well, I lost a lot of friends aboard that ship, too! At least you're still alive!" He was too angry to care about noting the expression of anger- or was it hurt?- that crossed Axilus's face, the way his mandibles grew stiff and flared out from his cheeks like he was trying to make himself look bigger, and the way his subvocals rose to an almost painful screech that probably would have deafened him at such close range had he the ability to hear the damn tones properly. Evolutionary intimidation tactic, probably. Turians _were_ predators. "Why are you so offended, anyway?! It's a turian thing! We relieve stress! Otherwise we're tense and angry all the time and getting anything done is impossible! And she _knows_ it doesn't mean anything!"

"Oh, is that _so?_ Such a convenient damn excuse."

"Why do you even care?!"

"Because I just fucking do!" Sometime during the argument, both of them had stood up, and Thie scowled and took a step closer and jabbed a finger at the turian's chest, ignoring the fact that not only was he covered in hard, rough plates that could probably very easily compromise his suit if he moved the wrong way, but he was also wearing what looked like turian light armor, which meant the only one who even felt the gesture was himself. He was just too pissed to care. It was the spirit of the thing that mattered. "You could have fucking mentioned you had a damned-"

Axilus howled in frustration and grabbed Thie's wrist to shove him away, hands shaking as he screeched, "I'm _gay,_ damn it!"

Thie stopped. His eyebrows shot upwards, and most of his rage drained away, replaced by the most baffling sense of confusion. Did his translator get that right? "I- you're _what?"_

"I'm _gay!"_ Axilus repeated, burying his face in his hands. "I don't like females like that, okay?! I never have! What me and Freiya do- she knows it doesn't mean anything like that!"

Sometime during the argument, Crux and Raik had returned, and Thie just barely noticed their presence somewhere off to the side, too focused on trying to sort out the mix of bewilderment and relief flooding through him. Why did he feel relieved about this, about Axilus being- what was the term his translator had chosen? "Gay"?

He absently ran a search on the term, staring at the letters hovering on his omnitool with wide eyes. Gay was one of many human terms used to describe sexual attraction patterns. Synonym: homosexual. Sexually attracted to males of the chosen species. Attraction to females is not unheard of, but highly uncommon. But if he wasn't attracted to females, then why did they...?

Luckily, the mess hall had cleared out during the hour or so Axilus had been gone, so there were only a few people staring at them following the argument, but it still felt like far too many eyes. At least the two krogan, who had by then retaken their seats, deterred them from staring for too long.

Thie shrunk back a little once he became aware of the looks regardless, silently cursing his stupid awkwardness, and turned his eyes up to give Axilus, now panting and half limp with the oddest hurt look on his face (Thie cursed the fact that of all the expressions that could transcend species, fucking hurt had to be among them), a bewildered look. "But- then, if you're like that, why do you-?"

"Because she's my _friend,_ and she _understands."_ Thie felt the oddest sense of guilt wash over him at Axilus's dejected tone. Strangely, he felt somehow obligated to apologize.

Except, he had no idea how to.

An awkward silence descended over them. Axilus fell back into his chair with a sigh too heavy for his age. Thie, still too lost in shock to consider the concept of sitting back down, suddenly became far, far too aware of the staring, the attention focused almost solely, it felt, on him. His skin prickled beneath his suit, and he instinctively hunched over, drawing into himself in an attempt to make himself look smaller. What little he'd come up with for an apology vanished in an instant, replaced by a numbing feeling of dread punching him hard in the gut. His mouth felt dry.

Nobody spoke for a long time. Desperate for a distraction, Thie began fiddling with his suit.

Then he awkwardly cleared his throat and forced his voice to work again. "I, uh..." Cleared it again. He looked away, gears working overtime to struggle through the bafflingly-complicated process of concocting an appropriate apology. "... I'm... sorry." Was that how you apologized? "Really." Damn it, why couldn't he be normal? Have a normal understanding of social mechanics? Where was Kel when he needed him?

Axilus didn't move for a few minutes. Then he sighed and lifted his head out of his hands, though he still didn't look at Thie, and he shrugged. "Ain't your fault, I guess. Probably should've mentioned..." He trailed off, and the awkward silence returned.

Thie squirmed. No, that wasn't how you apologized. Apologies made you feel better. But now he felt even worse.

It only took a few minutes for the terrible feeling to get to him, and he drew in a steadying breath and stiffly made his way to Axilus's side. Axilus blinked up at him, quite visibly confused, and Thie refused to meet his eyes as he leaned down and awkwardly wrapped one arm around the turian's shoulders. Then he quickly made his way back to his seat and became very interested in the wall.

He could feel everyone staring at him. It made him uncomfortable.

After a minute, he scowled and glared at each of them in turn. "What? The vids said..." He squirmed. "... if you fuck up, usually hugs fix everything. Look, I don't fucking know, all right? Leave me alone."

The awkward silence broke when Axilus snorted.

Thie jumped, then quickly fixed him with a glare. "What are you laughing at, asshole?"

The turian let out a loud, odd caw sort of sound which Thie supposed was a turian laugh and spread his mandibles wide, replying quite simply, "You."

Thie blinked. And he blinked again. Saying he was simply stunned by the sudden turn-around in the turian's composure would be a grand understatement, when he was actually positively blown away by how he'd apparently underestimated the (stupid moronic dumbass he just couldn't stay mad at) guy's ability to just be happy.

Then he finally managed a response, surprising even himself by cracking a very small, very short, but very present smile. Too bad Axilus couldn't see it. "Well, excuse the fuck outta me, but I'm not as naturally gifted with social skills as you obviously are. You ever try to find a decent instructional vid on interspecies social etiquette? It's damn near fuckin' impossible, is what it is."

"Yeah, but you hugged a _turian!"_

"Yes, and it was like hugging a fucking cliff face. Shut the fuck up, I didn't see _you_ being brave and apologizing."

"That was an _apology?_ Well, shit, you shoulda told me so I coulda got a sappy one-liner ready."

"Oh, you want a one-liner? Here's one for you: kiss my ass."

"Sorry, chief, but turians don't kiss."

"Well, better learn how to."

Smiling felt weird, the expression tugging at muscles in Thie's face that hadn't been used for years and lighting fires under emotions he hadn't felt in even longer, the feelings tapping sluggishly at the edges of his consciousness. It was a little unsettling, more than a bit uncomfortable, and almost tiring. But at the same time, something about it just told him that this meant everything was going to be all right.

It felt good. He could put up with this emotional business if that was what came from it.

It took a little bit of time before the awkwardness faded, but about an hour of friendly banter later, everything was almost back to normal. Thie and Axilus returned to jabbing good-naturedly back and forth at each other, while Raik and Crux mostly looked on in amusement, contributing only every once in a while with some witty comment or some well-timed snark.

The almost came from the fact that Thie was now sitting in Axilus's lap. Or, as close as he could with the damn cowl jabbing him in the back.

To make a long story short, truth or dare in a group with some really odd senses of humor tended to have some amusing consequences.

To his credit, Crux hadn't initially believed Thie would do such a thing when he'd dared him to do the deed, particularly after the argument they'd just had. Honestly, he'd expected to be biotically shoved out of his chair or something to that accord. But Thie, who normally shied away from contact, obviously had other ideas, and didn't even hesitate in scooting his seat over into Axilus's lap. Axilus had seemed a bit worried at first, but relaxed once it became quite clear that no, Thie's fever hadn't returned, and no, he wasn't about to keel over any second now from delirium. He just accepted the fact that there was no logical explanation for Thie's actions anymore.

Which made explaining what was going on quite entertaining to onlookers once Kel'Raanis finally arrived in the mess hall.

Kel was a short little guy, standing at about Thie's chin while Thie stood at almost precisely the galactic average (in human measurements, around 5'7", give or take), but what he lacked in height, he made up for in spades with enthusiasm. Thie hadn't met another quarian with quite the amount of pure, unadulterated spunk he'd seen in Kel'Raanis before, and while sometimes it got on his nerves, Thie had to admit that it came in handy, having the one consistently over-excited, hyper-sociable quarian to balance out his own nihilistic, anti-social self. Especially during negotiations.

Without going into detail, Kel had proven very early on that he made a much better diplomat than Thie did. Much more patience. Also less tendency to 'accidentally' throw people over railings and down stairwells when they wouldn't see his way.

Good times.

The kid, as Thie 'affectionately' (he refused to admit it an affectionate action, instead claiming it just fit the other quarian better than his name, because that was how Thie functioned) referred to him, stood right on the brink of biological adulthood (while Thie had passed it two years ago) and it showed in his voice, which alternated from high- to mid-pitched with each mood and frequently cracked at the worst of times, making him sound like little more than a very lost teenager. Which wasn't far off, especially in terms of naïvète, which, regrettably, he had more than his share of.

He also had a freakish overabundance of freckles, as Thie had noticed once when Kel was cleaning his mask following a mild suit breach (another long story made short, biotics hated _all_ suit seals, not just Thie's), sprinkled all over his cheeks and nose, and the tannest skin and reddest hair he'd ever seen on a quarian. Kel faintly reminded him of the 'surfer dude' humans seemed to like so much, only with the atrocious accent replaced by a faint lisp. He even had the personality for it.

Where Thie was quiet and withdrawn, Kel was loud and lively, a natural born socialite. He was brash, naïve, and hot-headed, but he was compassionate, cheerful, and a damn loyal follower of the galactic moral code. In short, he was the perfect inverse of Thie, which made their unlikely friendship all the more appalling even to them.

And of all Kel's clashing qualities, all the things which, in someone else, would have pushed Thie to biotically pitch them through the nearest bulkhead after a mere minute, the one that caught Thie off-guard the most wasn't his bright cheerfulness or his unending sympathy for every other species, or even his increasingly annoying objections to Thie's (admittedly bizarre) moral decisions.

It was his damn bluntness.

"Wow, Thie, are you drunk?" was the first impression the two who'd never met him before were given once he arrived, quite suddenly standing innocently at Axilus's elbow.

Somehow, Thie had forgotten that what Kel lacked in observational skills seemingly went to his freakish ability to spontaneously pop up at the most inopportune times. To think he had turned down Infiltrator training.

The kid hadn't even flinched when Axilus, startled out of his wits, had let out a very bird-like noise of distress and tumbled out of his chair, taking the still quite injured Thie down with him. He just watched them curiously as Axilus grumbled his way to his feet and assisted the now-fuming quarian, formerly in his lap and presently sprawled across one of the table legs, back into his former seat to the chorus of loud krogan guffawing from across the table, which ceased once Thie threatened to Throw them both across the mess hall.

"Nice to see you too, Kel," Thie dryly stated, twisting to give the other quarian a dirty look. If his arm had ached before, he'd need a new, much more potent word to describe the proper amount of absolute agony radiating from it now that it had quite enthusiastically introduced itself to the floor at terminal velocity. His leg was much the same way except somehow worse, and it was all he could do to keep from letting loose on the pained swears slowly bottling up inside him. "How many times do I have to tell you to warn me before you sneak up on me?"

"You mean this is a regular thing?" Axilus looked bewildered, and more than a bit worried when Thie sighed and nodded the affirmative. He'd grown used to the other quarian constantly popping up at his elbow, but being away from his shenanigans had apparently thrown Thie off his groove. Normally he could predict when the kid was going to spontaneously show up and scare the piss out of him.

Kel just grinned like he always did. Thie could tell even through the mask, because his shoulders rose about a half an inch and his chin inclined a few degrees. Not universal quarian body language, but he'd quickly learned to recognize Kel's personal tells, of which there was no shortage of since quarians, especially those with an excess of energy such as Kel, tended to speak more body language than words. The suits made it a much easier alternative to having to guess emotional states by tone. Besides, it gave them something to do with their hands.

Thie could almost imagine the toothy, dorky grin plastered across his face beneath the polarized glass. "You look like crap, Thie. Is your arm okay? And your leg? Oh, do you still have an infection? I have extra antibiotics if you need them."

Beside him, Axilus gave a soft snort and leaned back, mumbling something about the other quarian's strange little accent, which sounded almost like his tongue was a tad too big for his mouth. Thie elbowed him, hard, and Axilus yelped, gave a keening whine, and reluctantly, thankfully, shut up. Kel remained happily oblivious, and Thie gave a silent sigh of relief. Poor kid got enough shit back home for his lisp.

He sighed, rolling the shoulder his injured arm was attached to back a few times. The fall had jammed the joint up something fierce, and moving it felt something akin to the nerves surrounding it lighting on fire all at once. It was nothing compared to the inferno currently dancing a samba in his leg, but it still smarted. "Yes, they're fine, and they both hurt because they're broken and broken bones hurt like a bitch. Yes, I still have an infection." He saw Axilus tense out of the corner of his eye, and quickly added, "But I'm fine. I'm recovering just fine."

Then he turned his attention fully back on Kel. "Where have you been? I heard Lieutenant Nieght wanted to talk to you, but what for?"

Kel stared at him for what felt like an eternity, suddenly freezing and tensing ever so slightly. He didn't respond, almost didn't breathe. For a minute, Thie feared he'd broken him somehow.

Then he just shrugged and seemed to lose track of the conversation all of a sudden, something he _never_ did, instead waving to Raik. "Hi, Raik. Hi, Raik's krogan friend."

The krogan grunted and gave a short nod. "Crux."

"Hi, Crux." His shoulders shifted upwards again, though the movement looked a little more forced than last time. He was nervous, talking with his hands. "I like your hide. Reminds me of Thie's suit."

Crux raised an eyebrow at the quarian, apparently unsure if that was an insult or a compliment, and didn't reply.

"Kel, you haven't answered my question." Thie crossed his arms and gave Kel the stink eye, (im)patiently drumming his fingers against the cast of his injured arm. The kid didn't like being grilled, never had, and knowing he was already nervous meant he wouldn't be able to hold out like he normally could. "You didn't get into trouble, did you?"

"What? No!" Kel paused, then squirmed a bit. His hands bolted up and he began anxiously twisting them together, trying to look like he was doing anything but. "She, uh, told me not to tell you guys. Especially not you guys. It's private."

Well, it hadn't taken long to get him to admit something _was_ up. Now he just needed to pry from him _what._

Axilus made a face, clearly as annoyed (surprisingly) as Thie was. How about that, it was a galactic thing to be offended by knowing you're being kept out of the loop, and on special fucking orders, too. Thie opened his mouth to tell Kel where the damned woman could shove her privacy.

Then his stomach growled, and Thie remembered he hadn't eaten in twelve-plus hours.

Axilus snorted again. Thie fixed him with a glare and he shut up immediately. At least he was learning. Then he sighed and turned back to Kel, nodding vaguely towards one of the unoccupied tables scattered around them. "Pull up a chair, we won't be leaving until after I've eaten something."

The smaller quarian's posture brightened, and his hands dropped to his sides, the tension flooding out of his pose. "Do I get something, too? I haven't eaten since this morning." He hunched his shoulders a bit and shuddered. "I'm getting seriously sick of nutrient paste."

Thie considered, then cracked a faint half-smirk half-smile. "Are you willing to take off your mask?"

Kel fidgeted.

"Then no."

Thie couldn't help a smirk from twisting up the corners of his mouth as Kel predictably began to whine. How about that? There were actual _upsides_ to already being sick. Like being able to tease other quarians who were too skeeved out by the possibility of getting sick to consider taking the risk if not just to enjoy some good old turian military rations. The unfiltered not-smoothie version that hadn't gone through a blender which (apparently thankfully, according to Axilus, who had obviously never been forced to live on nutrient paste for months on end) sapped the flavor right out of everything that went into it and left it a bland but sterile paste with the consistency and approximately the flavor of glue.

People always complimented the typical quarian build- fit and slender, the ladies with the perfect curves and the men with the wide shoulders and chest- which was one of the only nice things ever said about their race aside from their stereotypical engineering prowess. They seemed to think it was genetics.

Hah. What a load of varren shit.

Thie dared them to live on nothing but the barest of the bare necessities for months on end and see if they could do anything _but_ stay rail-skinny. It was fucking impossible. The damn tubes contained only the barest necessities nutrient-wise, meant only to sustain a young quarian until they acquired proper rations during their Pilgrimage. Most quarians eagerly did so, but, well, most quarians weren't quite so unlucky as Thie and Kel were.

Ugh. He would be glad if he never even had to look at those tubes again.

He patted Kel's shoulder, feigning sympathy in everything but tone. "Sorry, kid. You're stuck with nutrient paste." It wasn't that he _wasn't_ sympathetic, Keelah, no. It was just that he had more than a little trouble summoning up the energy to actually display his emotions than most other quarians. It didn't come naturally to him; in fact, it required quite a bit of effort, and quite often nobody even noticed the effort, so he rarely ever bothered. But he figured Kel deserved the effort. If only he had the energy. "Maybe I can talk the turians here into mixing you a ration smoothie."

Kel's shoulders drew up and his body tensed in disgust, and he shook his head. Thie could picture the grimace twisting his features. "No, no thanks, I'd rather the paste. Ew."

Huh. Well, apparently Axilus was right. Turian rations plus a purifier was worse than nutrient paste. At least something was. Good to know things could always get worse.

"Your loss." Thie shrugged. "We'll be right back."

* * *

  
As it turned out, 'right back' was an inappropriate choice of words, and in retrospect, Thie admitted he'd anticipated the fiasco a quarian trying to get something to eat in a turian kitchen would cause, he just hadn't quite figured the _scale._

First was getting to the damn line. You'd have thought these turians had never seen a quarian before by the way they practically leaped out of the way and stared. They wouldn't have had an issue at all if Crux hadn't taken offense and initiated a small beatdown with one turian who hadn't had the presence of mind to evacuate the area the moment he spotted the amalgamation of hulking krogan, stupidly-tall turian, and crippled quarian marching through the mess hall.

It had taken ten minutes to pull the two apart, five for Axilus to recover from the idiotic idea to headbutt a grown krogan, and _another_ five to drag the now-unconscious Crux into a corner. Plus the two or three it took for the krogan to come back around, get pissed, realize what happened, and join the rest of the mess hall in staring incredulously at Axilus.

Thie had a feeling that story was going to haunt him for the rest of his life. Axilus didn't seem too broken up about suddenly being known as the hardest head in the galaxy. In fact, he'd learned the turian expression of 'stupidly overenthused and way too damn proud' about then.

It almost took longer to drag Axilus away from the crowd and stop him from telling the tale of his father's supposed krogan heritage. Something which every turian present protested until Thie lost his temper (which didn't take too long) and sent one of them flying headfirst into the wall. That got them all to leave them alone.

Then came getting into the line.

Make no mistake, it was easy for Axilus and the two krogan. They slid right on into the line like they'd been practicing for that very moment their entire lives. And it probably would have been just as easy for Thie, had his leg not chosen that very moment to give out from strain.

Axilus had only been carrying him for a few seconds before the turian found himself sitting against the wall on the other side of the cafeteria, dazed. Thie woke up moments later in the exact same position, but this time in the arms of a very sturdy krogan.

Thie found out that day that trying to biotically blast a krogan was like trying to blast a wall.

A bunker wall.

The two-foot-thick brand.

Try as hard as you like, it doesn't fucking work.

Luckily for him, Crux forgave him almost instantly. After snarling at him, threatening to brain him with his bare hands, and (not that Thie would ever admit it) scaring the piss out of him again.

Thie couldn't help but feel just a bit jealous. Axilus had had no problem knocking the krogan loopy without even using his biotics, while Thie couldn't even manage to take him down with his strongest spike yet. Obviously, the galaxy had it out for him.

Axilus suggested he go sit with Kel'Raanis and offered to get him enough food to feed a dextro krogan. Thie, still quite envious, politely offered to biotically shove his head up his ass if he didn't shut the fuck up.

Then Crux got involved.

Thie was not happy when Raik deposited him into his seat back in the mess hall. Kel made the mistake of asking him what was wrong, and Thie overreacted and may or may not have biotically thrown him across the room, too. And promptly apologized when Crux intervened yet again and ominously promised to make sure he couldn't use his biotics ever again.

Thie didn't think the krogan could do such a thing. But he seriously didn't plan on testing that hypothesis. He valued his life, and his damned biotics, as much trouble as they caused, far too much. But that didn't mean he had to be all rainbows and sunshine once the three of them got back to the table.

Axilus stuck to his word. The trays he brought back were loaded to the brim, half of the better rations likely only granted to him because of his newfound biotic status and a vague rumor circulating of Lieutenant Nieght's interest in him. He sat down without a word, only offering Kel a shrug when he glanced from the tray and Thie to the turian with wide eyes. He then sat in silence and simply gaped as Thie unceremoniously tossed his mask to the table and began to stuff his face.

Thie had to admit later on that he still hadn't gotten used to eating real food by then, and while turian military rations were far from the gourmet meals one would normally expect for someone's first exposure to nonfreeze-dried, real food (in fact, there were more than a few things in the mess that he either only vaguely knew anything about or flat out didn't even recognize, and several things that, years later, he claimed he wouldn't touch with a thousand foot pole even if he had to choose between it and the damn nutrient paste), they were a million steps above the tasteless muck that he'd been living on for months, and when you were offered to have real food, no matter what type, after nothing but flavorless goop, it should be expected that you might sort of lose your senses to the overload of your, well, senses.

It made sense if you thought about it from a quarian's perspective.

It was food, damn it. Real food. And real food, no matter its quality, tasted infinitely better than paste. And food that tastes good does _not_ mix well with half-starved.

He choked once. Somewhere along the line, Axilus had stopped watching him and begun eating his own food, and around then, Thie's body realized that it had no idea how to process solid food, and so his throat decided to seize up around what he'd been in the process of swallowing and everything had gotten a little confused for a minute. Luckily, he sorted it out himself with only minimal sideways glances from the others, and he quickly returned to eating, stealing glances at the others after a thought.

He'd never seen another species eat before. It wasn't something you'd think to be curious of, most times, but that was because everyone was only interested in what everyone could see, like how they looked, their mannerisms, and how they spoke. Eating habits, as mundane as they might seem to the uneducated, were just as important, and just as wild and exotic, as their varied biology and appearances.

The krogan were a lot like the quarians, he could tell just from looking (unless they used photosynthesis, or maybe they did that freaky reptilian thing like those funny lifeforms without legs he'd seen in human documentaries where they unhinged their jaws and swallowed their prey whole, but that seemed highly unlikely, so he dismissed the thought, except to briefly entertain a terrible and quite obvious horror franchise idea), so he didn't really pay much attention to them, but the turians...

He hadn't the foggiest idea how turians could eat with their mandibles and lack of cheek pouches and everything, but, well, they sure as hell did, and it was fascinating to watch. Axilus took small bites, amusingly so for what he'd heard the turian appetite to be, with his mandibles pressed tight against his jaw to keep the food inside his mouth. It looked like something that had to be practiced, most likely. He couldn't see any other species being able to eat with those evil teeth and without cheek pouches very easily except with a whole hell of a lot of experience, or without making a very large mess in the process. Probably more of the latter than the former, it seemed most likely.

But either way, it was entertaining to watch.

... Maybe a little _too_ entertaining.

Axilus cocked his mandibles in that weird smile the second he caught Thie's eye. "You keep staring like that, I think I'm gonna have to start charging," he teased, and Thie jolted (inadvertently jarring his stiff shoulder, which immediately put up a rather painful fuss) and looked away immediately, cursing internally as he felt his cheeks heat up. He'd entirely forgotten that he didn't have the glass of his mask obscuring his face now, so things like staring were a little harder to hide since he hadn't the experience, and every display of emotion he relied on the polarized glass to hide from view was now plainly obvious, as made painfully clear when Axilus begun laughing and teasing him anew.

Apparently there was a little more experience around Thie's temper to be had for Axilus, because he didn't stop the teasing immediately as Thie would have liked (and, really, how was he to know what was to be expected yet, or what was coming?) and Thie's temper began to steam. He let it go on for what he felt to be a reasonable amount of time, but in reality was more like a few seconds, then growled and flung a hand out, notoriously short temper predictably boiling over, roaring, "Shut _up!"_

Axilus was caught off-guard by the little blue-white ball that struck him in the chest, and the muffled snickering coming from the two krogan exploded into full-on guffaws as he flew across the mess hall and crashed into the nearest wall with a loud, startled (and oddly birdlike) squawk. Kel, meanwhile, simply sighed and pressed a hand to his visor, mumbling, "Oh, not again," under his breath.

Thie, fuming now and angry (admittedly disproportionately so, but he didn't care), stood up and (as aggressively as he could manage, being injured with a bad leg and all) stormed over to the turian, who was still pinned to the wall by the glowing aura of the Throw that had gotten him there in the first place.

"Don't fucking tease me," he hissed, jabbing a finger into Axilus's chest. He wasn't a fan of showing his emotions in general, but his puzzlingly irrational anger made it hard for him to do anything but. He couldn't do a damn thing to the sneer distorting his features, which was more than a little concerning. Or, it would have been, had he been of the mentality to give even a quarter of a shit. "This is your last damn warning."

And then he stomped back to his seat, stubbornly ignoring the confused look that crossed Axilus's face and the half spoken question ("Wh- _huh?_ What the hell are you-") and only releasing him from the wall's grip as an angry, reluctant afterthought.

Kel was staring at him now, he realized once he sat back down and cooled off just a little bit, and even though his mask hid all of his emotions quite well, Thie couldn't mistake the look of amusement in the way he narrowed his eyes ever so slightly with a hidden smile and slowly shook his head. Thie bared his teeth in a scowl and bit back, "What are _you_ looking at?", and Kel simply shrugged and looked away.

Across the table, Axilus, now slowly making his way back to his seat with the kicked-puppy expression still plastered over his stupid face, shook out his shoulders and let the tension drain from his posture, though his mandibles kept fluttering anxiously against his jaw in a distinct expression of confusion. "What did I _do?"_ he asked once he was within an appropriate hearing range.

Despite Thie's warning glare, Kel shrugged and answered him. "Thie's temperamental. Like a krogan."

One of the krogan- Thie didn't bother to notice which- snorted.

Axilius huffed and plopped back down in his seat, gingerly rubbing at his fringe. "Yeah. No kidding. Warn me next time, would ya?"

"I thought Thie would control himself. Usually he's pretty good at it. But I guess the old human saying holds true." Thie stiffened, and he could hear the teasing smile creep into Kel's voice as he leaned forward and added, "He's only mean to you cuz he _likes_ you."

Thie sputtered incoherently, mortified when his cheeks began to glow with embarrassment. Both krogan cracked up again, the sheer volume of two nearby cackling krogan making the stunned quarian wish his audial input speakers were separate from his suit. Kel himself let out a little giggle. Axilus looked between the four other occupants of the table in obvious, oblivious confusion.

It took a while for Thie's vocabulary to switch back on, and he immediately fixed Kel with a dark glare, silently pleased somewhere in the back of his mind when the other quarian, though he still looked horribly amused, shrank back ever so slightly. "I know where you sleep," he growled, and everyone who had been laughing began anew, while Axilus continued looking on in blissful ignorance. "I am going to sneak into your room and move everything slightly to the left, I am going to infect your omnitool with a virus that sends fetish pornography back to your parents under your name, and I am going to make you pay for all the fuel we use during this disaster of a Pilgrimage."

In complete contrast to the intended effect of the threat, Kel abandoned his giggling tactic and instead switched to all-out, doubled-over laughter.

Thie's eye twitched. "Fuck you."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, THAT took forever to get out. I'm not entirely happy with this chapter, but my few readers were getting quite irritated with the lack of updating (sorry, Becks!) so I'm uploading it anyway.
> 
> Here's hoping the next chapter sits a bit better once I'm done.


	8. A Rough Start to a New Beginning

The August Meridian was a former Alliance vessel, and an ancient one, at that. Hardly big enough to call a ship, it consisted of a mere two decks- the main deck, where navigation and the cockpit sat nearly on top of each other, and the engineering deck, which shared a sliver of its space with the saddest excuse for a crew's quarters in the galaxy. Squeezed into the engineering deck sat a tiny box-like room only a few feet in diameter which, officially, was supposed to be the 'cargo bay' according to the worn schematics, but had since been taken over by Raik, Kel's new krogan friend, once he came aboard.

The captain's quarters, usually carefully placed somewhere of dignity in an ordinary ship, was instead crammed underneath the rather steep flight of stairs separating the two decks, and was about as large as a typical closet with all the comfort of a cargo deck. It had been relegated to storage the second the two quarians had first boarded the vessel, as it had been easier, and quite a bit more comfortable, for the two of them to split the crew quarters. This proved quite handy, as the room was easily emptied (they hadn't had much to store in it anyway, so it had mostly been sitting empty) and turned into an extra quarters for whichever new member of the crew felt inclined to sleep in a three-foot-tall, vaulted crawlspace.

The cockpit sat on the lip of the galaxy map that made up the entirety of the ship's navigation section, and had been Kel'Raanis's home for the past several months. It wasn't comfortable, and much of the equipment the pilot required either didn't work at all or malfunctioned endlessly, and what little of it didn't do either was horrendously miscalibrated, making flying the damn ship an endless heart attack that required constant, and he did mean _constant_ attention.

Meanwhile, down in Engineering, Thie had pretty much built his home around the drive core, and he spent every waking hour while they were flying camped at its side, carefully correcting every error and doing his best to repair whatever broke on the fly, with varied success. Whoever had programmed half the thrusters and a good number of the core's routines had either done a shoddy job of it or just not made sure to make it to last, because he found himself desperately trying to recalibrate and reprogram constantly during their flights, lest something go wrong and they come out of FTL to find themselves falling into the atmosphere of some random planet they weren't supposed to be anywhere close to.

He'd made a mistake, once, by expecting the drive core to hold together long enough for him to get something to eat. It had almost crashed them into a turian moon.

Luckily, Kel was a pretty decent pilot, so they'd only skimmed the atmosphere and been launched back out again, but it had been enough of a heart attack that Thie had promptly sworn to himself that he'd never leave the drive core mid-flight again.

The ship was a decrepit wreck on the fringes of falling apart, with no doubts to be had as to why the Fleet was able to obtain it at such a low price. And yet Thie was relaxed by the sight of it.

After the little mess in the mess hall (how appropriate a name), Thie had wanted nothing more than to leave the damn space station and get the hell away from turian space. He didn't even care if they just wandered around space for a while with no destination, or even if they went to fucking _Omega_ and just lazed around and tried not to _die_ for a few months. He just wanted to be away from the damn turians.

So the moment Kel had indicated that the August Meridian had been released from turian custody, he'd rounded up the ragtag team of aliens he'd somehow managed to accrue and immediately set off for the docks. The sooner they got away, the better.

Once they arrived, Thie, lagging behind the two krogan who were in the midst of chatting with Kel, was stopped by a hand on his shoulder before he could take even a step towards the ragged vessel.

"So, uh..." Axilus's mandibles were fluttering again, in that way they always did when he was anxious. He wasn't looking Thie in the eyes; his gaze seemed to be somewhere in the middle of his chest instead, pointedly avoiding his own. "I, uh... I guess this is it."

Thie hesitated and raised an eyebrow. "What do you mean?"

"I guess this is, uh, this is where we... part ways. Y'know." The turian's hand drifted up to tug idly at his cowl. "Cuz... I gotta stay here, and stuff."

"Oh." He was quiet for a moment, then nodded. "... yeah. I guess so."

An awkward silence descended upon them. Thie shifted his weight from one leg to the other, and hissed in pain when his bad leg protested the idle movement. Axilus fidgeted.

Then Kel appeared out of nowhere, slinging an arm around Thie's shoulders. "What are you waiting for?"

"What?"

"Don't you want to show him the ship?" He could hear the smile in Kel's voice as he seized Thie's hand and began pulling him towards the airlock. "It isn't much, but, hey, it's _our ship!_ Plus, I think the others wanna say goodbye, too. And anywhere's better for a goodbye than public. Right?"

Thie paused, then sighed and gave Axilus a helpless shrug as he turned and limped his way towards the ship. "He's right. C'mon, we may as well give you the grand tour." He snorted. _"Grand,_ yeah, right..."

The airlock gave a protesting whine as the doors swished shut, and after the decontamination procedures struggled their way to the finish line and the interior doors creaked open, Thie and the other aliens, led by Kel, stepped onto the claustrophobic main deck of their sad little ship. The lights slowly flickered on as the VI recognized their presence, illuminating the banged-up galaxy map, the holographic display of which always seemed to be a little on the pale side, the worn walkways, the dented bulkheads, and at last the tiny hole of a cockpit wedged under an uncomfortably-low ceiling of glass and blinking terminals.

Axilus made a definitively unimpressed noise, looking sheepish when Thie gave him the stink eye for it. "So, uh, this is what you guys have been calling home, huh?"

"Yep!" Kel was not deterred, happily prancing back to the cockpit with an audible smile. The chair groaned as he flopped down into it, protested as he turned, and whimpered as he leaned forward and began programming in a destination. From what Thie could see, he was setting it for the Citadel, which was good, because they hadn't exactly had time to pick up the supplies they'd needed in the first place when they'd landed on the tiny little human colony the slavers had found them on. "It may not look like much, and it really _isn't,_ but it's done us well for the past few months."

Raik made an ambivalent grunting sound and turned for the stairs. "Be in my quarters if you need me. Have fun showing Mads the ship, Tiny."

Thie grimaced at the nickname, watching as Raik, followed by Crux, headed for the stairs. "Yeah. Uh..." He awkwardly swept an arm towards the tiny room. "... welcome to the main deck, I guess. It really isn't much, but, well..."

Axilus was quiet for a moment, appraising it. Then he shrugged. "Can't really say I've seen worse, but at least it flies."

"Yeah, if the drive core even _works_ now."

"It does!" Kel twisted to flash them a thumbs-up. "Your commander gave the turian docking crew the order to give it some repairs, free of charge. So it might actually last us more than a month this time!"

"Really?" Thie's eyebrows shot upwards. "Does it actually hold a command now?"

"Sure does!" The other quarian turned back to his programming. "You should take Ax down there. It looks like an entirely new ship. Feels like one, too, if you close your eyes and pretend you don't hear the rattling."

"What rattling?" Axilus began to ask as Thie hurriedly grabbed his arm and began dragging him away, mandibles fluttering in what looked sort of like concern. He didn't resist, though. "Are you really sure you should be flying this ship if it's _rattling?"_

"Well, we don't have much choice," Thie grumbled. "Believe me, I wish we could get a new ship, but I highly doubt your turian buddies will sell me one for two hundred credits."

The turian gave him a sideways look. "Two _hundred?_ I thought your ship sent you a _lot_ of money."

"Two hundred _is_ a lot of money, considering we don't actually _use_  it on the flotilla."

"... oh." Axilus looked away and mumbled something about his weekly allowance being triple that sum, then yelped when Thie kicked him in the shin.

The two of them were quiet as they carefully strode down the stairs, Axilus making an oddly birdlike sound of concern when Thie's leg nearly gave out on him again. The next flight, he made sure he had a hand on the much smaller quarian's arm just in case it happened again. And just like that, they were at the drive core.

Thie whistled. "Wow. It _does_ look brand new."

Axilus, however, looked uncomfortable. "It looks like _shit."_

A yelp.

"Well, it does!" he whined, rubbing his arm as Thie glared at him. "I mean, it doesn't look _dangerously_ bad, but it still looks bad!"

"It looks ten times better than it did before." Thie closed his eyes and listened. The slight knocking, which Kel had traced to a faulty coupling in too dangerous a spot to replace it, was there, but the other, more disturbing sounds seemed to have vanished. "Sounds like it, too."

When he opened his eyes again, he had to hold back a snort at the expression of pure terror that had frozen on Axilus's face. "It was _worse_?!" he whispered in horror.

"Yeah." Thie tried very hard to hold back a snicker and nodded. "It was so bad, we weren't sure it wasn't just going to drop us out of FTL and into a planet's core. Conveniently for us, it didn't, but the risk was there. Shouldn't be now, though." He cracked a sinister smile and added, "Hopefully."

Axilus shuddered.

The drive core did, too.

Both of them looked up in surprise as the idle colossus lit up, shuddering into action with a horrific grinding sound that send red-hot bolts of pain through Thie's eardrums. Vaguely, he could hear Axilus screeching in a mixture of confusion and what might be either pain or pure, suit-wetting terror. Then it gave off a few bolts of energy and it _glowed._

He barely noticed as someone- he didn't know who, or even what- seized him about the waist and slung him over his shoulder, the sensation barely filtering through the haze of color and sound and confusion clouding his mind. Vaguely, he registered a hot coal of pain which seemed to be wedged against the base of his skull, lighting fires of agony which raced throughout his body. He hovered on the brink of oblivion for only a second, and then something dragged him back.

Thie gasped and sat bolt upright, his unspoken confusion hissing out as a low, pained moan as the fire flared and then dimmed, withdrawing into a hot, burning ball at the back of his neck. He could feel the heat through his suit, and finally registered that his implant had somehow overheated- again- before giving a quiet groan and slumping backwards. "Keelah, that was _horrible,"_ he moaned. "What _happened?"_

One of the krogan- he thought, through his blurry vision, that he saw a mess of brown- grunted, and answered simply, "You passed out."

Thie muttered some choice words his translator didn't quite pick up and rubbed the back of his neck, grimacing. "Go fuckin' figure. But what about the drive core?"

"Dunno. Mads went up to check it out."

"Mads?"

"Madelivio." Raik, as he could now recognize, cracked a small smile. Or maybe it was a smirk; it looked a bit too toothy to be a smile, persay. "Too much of a mouthful for such a skinny kid, so he's Mads to me."

Thie blinked at him. Then he shook his head and attempted to stand up, though it was difficult with two casts immobilizing his limbs. "Help me up."

Raik raised one of the ridges that might be a krogan eyebrow.

Thie rolled his eyes. _"Please."_

The krogan grunted and reached down, wrapping one massive hand around Thie's forearm, then pulled. Thie stumbled, caught himself, then straightened himself out with a huff. "Thank you," he crisply replied. Then he stormed towards the stairs.

After a little stumbling up the stairs, during which he gave up on walking, sat down, and scooted his way up, he stomped into the cramped main deck- noting, with no small amount of confusion, that an unfamiliar planet which most certainly was not the Citadel now hovered where the galaxy map once had- and glared at the back of Kel's head. "What the _hell_ was _that?"_ he hissed through gritted teeth.

Standing behind the pilot's seat, Axilus turned and gave him a helpless look. "He won't tell me. Thie, make him tell me what's going on!"

With a groan, Thie stormed up and pushed the turian out of his way, ignoring the cold, tight feeling growing in his chest. "Kel'Raanis nar Anaid," he growled, doing his best to sound intimidating even through the trembling which shook his voice, "what the _hell_ are you doing."

Kel flinched, refusing to look back at either of them, though Thie noticed a quick jerk in his shoulders that meant he wanted to. "I, uh..."

 _"Now,_ Kel."

"Sh-she, uh..." The younger quarian's voice rose to a squeak and he hunched his shoulders. "She told me not to tell you!"

"Who?" _"What?"_

"She told me not to tell you!" he repeated, voice cracking from the stress. "I'm sorry! She told me- she told me not to let you go back!"

"What the _hell_ are you _talking_ about?!"

"I can't tell you!"

Thie grit his teeth and growled under his breath, then inhaled, mind racing to prepare the most intimidating response it could think of.

He didn't get it out.

 _"QUIET!"_ came a deafening howl from the stairwell, a krogan scream using both sets of lungs for optimal volume which sent Axilus screeching to the airlock and Thie down to the floor with an agonized yelp as his audial input speakers screamed with feedback. By the time he'd recovered, both krogan stood before them, one looking somewhat surprised and the other only mildly annoyed.

Raik, who he presumed to be the one who had shouted from the irritated scowl on his face, looked sharply between the two quarians and the now-quite-thoroughly-terrified (and still screaming in terrible noises Thie was sure even turians didn't have words for) turian still stubbornly stationed by the airlock. "You," he said, pointing at Thie, "shut up. You," this time he pointed at Axilus, "shut up. _You,"_ and he pointed to Kel, "start talking. What's going on here?"

Kel's shoulders relaxed and he let out his held breath in a long, low sigh. He didn't turn around. "The, uh, the lady- the commander lady?- she, um, told me not to let... any of you guys... go back..." His voice rose again, sounding nearly as panicked as the turian still screaming in the corner. "And- and she told me not to tell you, either! She- she said you wouldn't- do it if I... if I told you-"

"Hold that thought." Crux grumbled and crossed the tiny room, seized Axilus by the shoulder, and clocked him hard upside the head, ending the drawn-out shriek with a loud yelp. He then returned to his spot and nodded. "Continue."

Kel was quiet for a moment, and for a second, Thie was afraid he'd broken him. Then he took another deep breath and began speaking again. "She, uh..." His voice grew very quiet, too quiet to hear.

Apparently he wasn't the only one. Crux grunted and crossed his arms. "Want to say that again for those of us _without_ enhanced hearing?"

"..." He sighed. "We're, uh... Under her orders, we're... going to, uh... to Palaven."

Several moments of awkward silence later, Thie recovered from his minor heart attack and, hands still shaking, buried his face (well, mask) in his hands, sinking to the floor. "Ohhh, _Keelah..."_

"Did I hear that right?" Raik glanced from Crux to the crouching quarian (who was currently in the midst of staving off a panic attack, surprisingly enough) to the now-too-quiet Axilus and back again, then shrugged when nobody responded. "Gee, thanks. _Really_ answered my question, guys. Love the help."

Axilus made a sound similar to the air being let out of a balloon and squeaked, "My mom is gonna _kill_ me."

One of the krogan snorted, and he jumped half out of his, uh, plates, spun around, and made some gestures anyone short of a hanar could recognize as vulgar. " _Shut up_! You've obviously never met my mom!" His voice rose, whether in fear or rage, Thie honestly couldn't tell. "She'll eat a krogan like you for _dinner,_ man! Do _not_ laugh at this!"

Crux cracked a very odd smile. "If that's true, I think this ought to be fun. Dunno why you idiots are freaking out."

"Tuchanka's worse," Raik supplied with a shrug.

"Yeah, exactly."

"Not than my _mom!"_ Axilus wailed. "She tried to throw my dad in the _drive core_ the first time they met!"

"So? My dad threw me at a thresher maw. Not for fun or anything, just to slow it down." Thie couldn't tell if Raik was joking or not, not with the deadpan tone he delivered the line in. "Didn't work. Thresher maw still went after him. It just had a new hat for a few minutes."

Axilus stared at him for a second, mandibles spread wide in what Thie suspected to be an expression of pure confusion. Then he shook his head. "Yeah, well-"

"And _my_ dad threw _me_ at a hoard of _klixen,"_ Crux cut in with a stupid grin on his face. "For _sport,_ too. Turns out a bunch of other idiots bet him I wouldn't last two minutes. About pissed themselves when I walked out not just _alive,_ but with a _brand new_ grenade launcher one of them had bitten off a scout. Arm was still stuck on it, too. _That_ was fun to dig out."

"You're lying."

"So?"

Raik gave a short bark of a laugh and grinned. "I like this guy." Then he gave Thie an approving nod. "Let's keep him."

"Did I tell you about the time I fell in the varren pit?" Crux began, but Thie cut him off before he could start bragging about something else that never actually happened, either.

"Are you saying our lives are in _danger_ by going to Palaven?" Thie asked, gritting his teeth in irritation as he felt his heart speed up and his breathing grow heavier. Damn whatever was happening to him; it was making him feel so weak. "Your mother will seriously try to _kill_ us?"

"Well, no..."

"Then what the _fuck_ are you talking about?"

Axilus fidgeted, then mumbled, "Look, my mom's just _really_ intimidating, okay? And she doesn't like it when I bring _turians_ home, let alone, y'know..." He glanced at the two krogan, then at Kel, and then up at Thie. "... two krogan and two quarians. Especially with the, uh, reputation your guys's species have..."

Kel made an odd sound and twisted to give Axilus a death glare that managed to make it through his mask. "What was that?"

 _"What?_ I'm not saying-- Look, you _know_ quarians have a bad rep in the galaxy!"

"He has a point." Crux gave Axilus a vaguely disapproving look. "Rude."

Axilus whined a little. "Look, I'm just trying to warn you guys, okay? I mean, I already know my mom's gonna kill _me,_ just saying you guys should probably be ready to have your asses chewed out too, is all..." He added in a grumble, "After she's already killed me, raised me from the dead, let my _dad_ kill me, and done it all over again..."

Thie groaned and buried his head in his hands again, then slowly struggled to his feet, cursing himself for forgetting that getting to the floor was easy, but getting up, well, that was a different story. "Okay, well, now that that's sorted out, and now that we're going to _have_ to deal with a grouchy turian mother," he grumbled, shooting both Kel and Axilus an accusatory glare, "I'm going to go take a damn nap. If I'm going to die, I'm doing it lucid, not on three hours of sleep and six of unconsciousness. I've had enough passing out for the rest of my life."

"Works for me," Crux responded, and Raik grunted in agreement and added, "I think we all ought to get some sleep. Dunno about the rest of you idiots, but a few hours alone, not having to worry about turians leering at me or doctors poking me and getting their heads knocked off, sounds like heaven." He paused, then shrugged. "Or whatever that one human saying is. Later, losers."

Axilus watched both krogan lumber off, then glanced at Thie, mandibles fluttering nervously. "Uh..."

"That means you, too, kid." Thie grumbled and limped for the stairs. "Kel, I'm going to the drive core. Page me if you need to switch."

"The drive core?" Kel turned to give him an odd look. "Why the drive core?"

"I'm pretty sure the other krogan just took the crew quarters for himself."

"Oh..."

Thie just shrugged and began slowly limping his way down the stairs, then squawked in surprise when a large, clawed hand wrapped around his upper arm, its stupidly tall owner spontaneously appearing at his side to carefully help him along. "Where did you come from?"

"Well, you almost killed yourself on the stairs last time," Axilus mumbled, giving a half-hearted shrug. "Wouldn't really be good if we got to Palaven and my mom found out I let a crippled quarian fall down the stairs and die of a broken spine."

Thie just raised an eyebrow. "Uh-huh."

Axilus fidgeted. Then he whined, shrinking back a little. "What is it you don't get? My mom is _scary,_ dammit!"

"Uh-huh." With a shake of his head, he glanced back at the bottom of the flight of stairs as it approached and attempted to shake Axilus's hand off. When it didn't work, he huffed and turned to give the turian a hard glare. "Let go of me."

No response.

He shook his arm again, harder. "I said, let _go."_

Still nothing. Axilus had a distant look in his eyes, his mandibles slackening. Despite his efforts to think otherwise, Thie found this incredibly troubling.

He sighed a little, then reached up and gently smacked Axilus upside the head. One bird-like screech and a near suit rupture later, Axilus was back in action, albeit confused, and Thie was standing with his arms crossed, huffing in his general direction. "You scared me with that. What the hell happened?"

"What are you _talking_ about?" Axilus spread a mandible and cocked his head in confusion. "We got to the bottom of the stairs and you just _hit_ me! If _anyone_ should be explaining _anything,_ it oughta be _you!"_

 _"Excuse_ me? What are _you_ talking about?" Thie scowled and planted his hands on his hips. This play-stupid routine was getting really old. "We got to the bottom of the stairs and you bugged out. Stopped moving. Blue-screened. You wouldn't even let go of me until I hit you, and then you tried to kill me."

"I- _What?"_ Axilus's jaw dropped, and he cocked his head sharply, angling out and fluttering both mandibles. "What are you- I did- _what?"_

"I don't fuckin' know. You just stopped. You were helping me down the stairs, then you just stopped." He gave a frustrated shrug. "Like you just saw someone die or something."

That struck a nerve.

Axilus's frame tensed as though he'd been shot, mandibles clamping in tight against his jaw and muscles going rigid. Even through the thick plating, Thie could see the blood drain from his face.

There was a long, awkward silence before Thie shifted and quietly asked, "What did you remember?"

The turian wasn't moving. Hardly even breathed. And then he relaxed ever so slightly and mumbled, "Haldrus."

Thie hesitated, then, slowly, offered, "You gonna be okay?"

Axilus began to nod, changed his mind, paused, and slowly shook it. "... no."

"..." Heaving a heavy sigh, Thie wrapped a hand around Axilus's upper arm to steady himself and slowly began inching towards the drive core. When he resisted, mostly out of surprise, he sighed again and said, "Come on. Even if you don't sleep, I think you'll need the company."

There was a long, drawn out silence. Then Axilus gave a small appreciative nod, and Thie could just barely hear him whisper, "Thanks."

* * *

 

_Two hours earlier..._

"What do you mean, he can't come back?"

"The Cabal unit won't be good to him. Not him, not at all. He needs to leave."

"Are you... are you _sure?"_

"Positive."

"But what if he-"

"Don't tell him. Just leave. Go to Palaven."

"Why Palaven?"

"That's where his mother lives. I gave her a call not long ago. She'll be as glad to see him as he'll be to see her."

"Are you sure this is a good idea? I mean, I'm just- What if your superiors-"

"You can do this, Kel'Raanis. And don't worry about me. I can handle myself."

"If you say so... Thank you."

"Don't mention it. I mean it.

"You'd better leave. Your ship will be ready soon, and I want you out of here the second it's finished.

"Good luck."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this took forever because between this update and the last, I moved into my college dorm! :D One whirlwind of an adjusting period later and my inspiration for this fic has returned in spades.
> 
> Followers of this fanfic should thank my datemate, Becky, and their magnificent ability to give me the most perfect ideas to pull me out of the writer's block I'd let myself get wedged into. Updates should start coming at least a little faster now that they're helping me!


	9. I Scream, You Scream, We're All Screaming and I Want a Mom But Not This One

Waking up onboard a familiar ship was comforting, and would be for anyone, especially after the mess of the past couple weeks which still haunted Thie with nightmares and constant worries that shook him to the core. Even though the scenery was different, since he'd slept in the drive core instead of the crew quarters, it still gave him an odd sense of relaxation which settled over all of his limbs and calmed his growing-frantic breathing.

Waking up to the familiar hum (and slightly unnerving rattle) of a drive core was just the same, particularly for a space-oriented species like the quarians. Knowing he was in no danger of immediate depressurization and ejection from the craft, or of waking up to the craft unceremoniously dissolving in a high-speed comet bound for the surface (or gravity well, in the case of gas giants, which didn't have a surface as much as a miniature event horizon surrounding a tiny metallic core) of a nearby planet, was incredibly reassuring for anyone, but especially for someone with a ship whose drive core was notorious for going offline at the worst of times.

Waking up with a snoring turian wrapped around your midsection, however, was not.

The kid had an impeccable grip. Thie had to give him that, he grudgingly admitted as he squirmed around, trying his best to pry his arms from beneath the iron vises of Axilus's arms which pinned them to his sides. He couldn't get out, no matter how hard he tried. And to make it worse, the kid had his head resting on Thie's shoulder, sword-edged crest pressing dangerously hard against his upper back. One wrong move and, he feared, his suit would be gone.

Couldn't have that. He wriggled and growled a little, hissing, "Axilus!"

No response.

He tried again. "Axilus!"

The turian grunted and only gripped him tighter. Thie's chest was beginning to ache.

"Naturally..." With a little huff, he called up whatever sleepy biotic power he could manage, ignoring the angry buzz at the back of his skull for the time being, and pushed back against Axilus's chest, the crest of which just barely brushed against his back unless he strained. Luckily, the weak field the motion generated was enough to push him back, and as Thie scrambled away, Axilus hit the deck with a clank and a muffled whine.

"What was that for?" he whined as he sat up, rubbing his head where it had impacted the metal grating that made up the floor in Engineering. Despite being a turian, and therefore having a great deal of trouble showing emotion using only stiff plates and odd quirks of the mandibles which constituted body language in the turian mind, Axilus had no trouble looking positively pitiful. It was almost enough to make him feel bad. Almost.

Thie stood, dusting himself off, and huffed a bit again, arms crossed. "I said you didn't have to spend the night alone. That doesn't mean you need to wrap around me like you're trying to suffocate me in my sleep."

"I did what?" Damn that turian puppy-dog expression. No evolutionary link between birds and dinosaurs had any business being able to make that sort of face.

"Nothing, Axilus." He rolled his eyes, stretching. "Come on, get up. I'm sure we're nearly there."

"Where? Oh, wait, right, Palaven." The turian popped up so quickly Thie jumped and trotted for the door, looking impatiently back when Thie didn't immediately follow. "C'mon, slowpoke! Y'know, for wanting _me_ to be quick, _you_ sure are taking your time."

His tone was cheerful, almost playful, but Thie didn't catch on and scowled. "Shut up," he grumbled, storming past him as angrily as a short, crippled quarian could. Crux was just emerging from his quarters as well, and gave Thie a short, acknowledging nod. "Just come on. I bet Kel's been waiting."

"Fine, fine." Axilus trotted along after him, his toeclaws making a distinct, slightly unnerving clicking noise against the floor panels. "How long were we out?"

Thie checked his omni-tool. "Eight hours, give or take." Wow, quite a while. He was used to six hour shifts, not eight. He must have been _exhausted._

Axilus must have thought the same, because he whistled and clicked his mandibles against his jaw. "The LC would be _pissed_ if she knew."

"Why?" He twisted to give the turian a short, odd look, then turned back to put all his concentration into climbing the stairs without falling down and getting injured yet again.

"That's, like, seven and a half more hours than I normally sleep."

He did a double-take. "You're _joking."_

"Nah." Axilus grinned that odd turian grin, prancing up to Thie's side to help him up the stairs. "I usually get ten, twenty minutes of sleep. Regs tell us to get at least three hours, but insomnia's a bitch. C'mon, you're taking too long, lemme help."

Thie grimaced and, with a low huff, acquiesced, reluctantly leaning into Axilus to take the weight off of his injured leg. "I didn't know you were an insomniac."

"Yeah, well, neither did the LC until she found me in Engineering after hours."

"Do I want to know?"

"Not really." Axilus grinned. "It'd take too long to explain."

Thie blinked at him, staring blankly until the turian coughed and glanced away. Then he rolled his eyes and attempted to push him away. "You can let go now, we're off the stairs."

"I know." Axilus tightened his grip. "But you're warm, plus I'm pretty sure you shouldn't be putting so much stress on your leg. When I broke mine, I was told to keep weight off it for three months solid."

"Yes, well, you're a turian and I'm a- wait, _three months_?"

"Yeah, long story short, plates don't like being broken, especially in primary load-bearing locations." Axilus gave a sheepish shrug. "Also, lesson learned, turian chicks don't belong in trees."

He stared at Axilus.

Axilus stared back.

Then Thie just shook his head and wriggled. "Please let go."

"You're gonna fall."

"No, I'm not. Let go."

"I'm gonna tell you 'I told you so'."

"Fine. Just let go."

He let go. Thie wobbled, wincing as the sudden addition of 55 kilograms of weight, dispersed or not, made his injured leg burn in agony for about half a second before it settled into a throbbing ache which, while it didn't feel like his leg was going to snap in half anymore, was hardly any better. But he didn't fall.

Axilus watched him for a minute, then slung an arm around his shoulders. "C'mon, you need to go sit down."

Thie growled and shoved his hand off, giving the turian a scathing glare which might have sent him up in flames if not for his mask. "I'm _fine."_

"Nope." Suddenly, Thie found himself in the arms of a very large, very brown krogan, who swiftly turned and marched towards the tiny cockpit. Raik had an odd little smile twisting up the corners of his torn lips, shifting his grip on the tiny quarian now in his arms to make him at least slightly more comfortable. "You're not breaking that leg again on my watch. Until further notice, you're riding shotgun on a krogan."

Thie sputtered and Axilus burst into peals of loud, almost painfully piercing laughter behind them. "Put me down!"

The krogan grinned, or maybe he sneered. It was hard to read krogan faces. "Nah. You're just gonna get yourself hurt again. This way, I can keep you out of trouble."

"This is embarrassing!"

"You were asking for it."

"I think I'd remember asking to be carried around like a crippled war prisoner by a krogan!"

From somewhere behind them, Crux laughed and patted Thie's head as he passed by. "Try not to drop him, Red. He might break."

"I'm not even red."

"Fine, then. Brownie Boy."

"I'm three times your age, whelp."

"Fine. Shitstain."

"Let's just stick with Red."

Crux cracked a smile. Or, Thie _thought_ it was a smile. Krogan faces, man. "You gonna carry Tiny through Cipritine, too?"

"Eh, maybe." Raik glanced at Thie, then looked down at his leg, then just shook his head. "You're a mess, kid. I bet if I put you down, you'll have that leg broken in four places instead of two."

"Two? Wait, I thought it was just..."

"Nah. You really fucked yourself up. Broke your leg in two places and everything. You quarians are made of glass as it is, I'm guessing you being biotic just made it worse."

"Yeah, so they tell me..." Thie grumbled and squirmed. "Will you just put me down already? I have legs, I can walk. And I'm _not_ going to break my leg again, you ass. Stop insulting me."

"Nah."

"I'm going to... fuck, what the hell do you even _do_ to a krogan?" Thie groaned. "At least you can harass a turian without getting your ass kicked." From somewhere behind them, Axilus made a vaguely birdlike sound of protest, which Thie chose to flat out ignore. "Damn you, krogan."

Raik grinned. "Heh."

Kel twisted around in his seat to shake his head at the four of them. "Are you ever going to make it to the cockpit, or do I need to get up and come back there to brief you?"

"You could just yell. This ship's small enough-"

"Don't call it a ship, you're insulting real ships."

"Fine. This _closet's_ small enough. We can all hear you."

The tiny quarian just shrugged and turned around again. "We're almost there. Cipritine, right?"

"Yeah." Axilus pushed past the two krogan and leaned against the pilot's seat. "It's a really nice city. Huge as hell, but nice."

"Yeah, so I've heard." Kel twisted to look at Axilus, craning his neck, then gave up and just glanced back at the dashboard. "Which port is closest to where we gotta go?"

"Umm..." Axilus considered, then pointed at a location on the little mini-map projected on the dash. "That one. My mom's apartment is right down the road, we can catch a bus and be there in ten."

"Your mom's apartment?" Thie raised an eyebrow, squirming again in a vain attempt to get away from Raik, who had, by then, moved up behind Axilus as well. "I thought your parents were military, figured they'd have a house or something..."

"Nah. No one has houses in Cipritine. Not home long enough." Axilus shrugged. "Most everyone's military, and deployments are pretty long, so we're only home for, um... maybe a month or two at a time? I think the only reason my mom's home is because she doesn't have an active project right now..."

"What does your mom even _do?"_

"Uh..." The turian coughed awkwardly. "She may or may not be an extremely high-ranking engineer, and my dad may or may not be a guard for the Primarch."

Crux whistled. Raik raised an... eye ridge? Was that the right term? Thie and Kel just blinked.

"... the Primarch. The big cheese. The head honcho. The guy in charge of everything except life itself." Axilus glanced between the two of them, then just stared at Thie. "You're kidding. You don't know who the Primarch is."

Thie blinked at him. Then he slowly pointed at Axilus. "Turian." Then he pointed to himself. "Quarian."

"But-"

"I'm only twenty years old, what do you want from me?"

Axilus just blinked at him, then shook his head. "I can't believe you don't know who the... When we get there, me and my mom are gonna educate the fuck out of you heathens."

"Hey-!"

"We're there!" Kel interrupted, sitting bolt upright all of a sudden, fingers flying over the holo-interface. "Cipritine Control, this is the August Meridian, are we free to land?"

_"Your credentials check out. Proceed to Hanger C-41, and welcome to Cipritine, August Meridian."_

* * *

Ten minutes later, four people stepped off of the August Meridian. About half a minute later, the fifth was on the ground too, having wriggled his way out of a krogan's grip by some grace of the ancestors, and was on his way to leaning very heavily against the single turian of the group.

Axilus grinned, looking around with mandibles spread wide. "You don't realize how much something means to you until you're away at boot camp for a year and a half. Never thought I'd miss a port, but, well..."

"Yes, yes, good, well, where do we go?" Thie grumbled a little, readjusting his weight until his leg had mostly stopped screaming at him in a mixture of agony and what he assumed was irritation from being ignored.

"Huh? Oh, yeah, this way." With a happy hum (half of which buzzed painfully just out of hearing, thanks to turian subvocals), he pranced off, leaving Thie to fall clumsily against Crux, who just laughed and scooped him up before following.

They walked for a while. Quite a while. So long, in fact, that Thie found himself rather grudgingly grateful that Crux happened to be carrying him for ninety percent of it. He did, of course, struggle his way to freedom anyway, mostly out of stubbornness, but only once they were near the public transport terminal that Axilus cheerfully said they'd be taking to his mother's apartment. That way, he only had to walk a little bit. His leg was quite thankful. Probably.

The bus station was much smaller than Thie expected, with only two little benches sitting back to back and a small metal-like ceiling to protect waiting pedestrians from Trebia's unforgiving rays. He'd been expecting something big and grandiose for the turian capital city, but he wasn't complaining, not when there was finally somewhere for him to sit down and take some weight off of his damn leg. Thie gratefully did so once he was close enough, wincing as his leg continued its campaign to bisect itself once more. "Why is the station so small?" he asked, glancing up at Axilus.

Axilus shrugged, bouncing from one foot to the other with eyes locked on the horizon. "Most turians prefer walking. We have a lot of energy-- apex predators and all. The buses are really just for the injured or aliens."

"Well, how convenient that I happen to be both," he grumbled, leaning back. Kel took a seat beside him after a minute or two of contemplation, and the krogan just stood by Axilus like a row of towers protecting the two little quarians from the sun's radiation. "How long is the wait?"

"Maybe ten minutes if we're unlucky and just missed the bus. I'm betting on less."

"And how long will the ride be?"

"Two minutes, tops. I told you my mom lives close, I just figured it'd be easier on you if we took a bus instead of walking."

Thie grumbled a bit, then reluctantly replied, "Thanks."

The wait was uneventful and, luckily, quite short. True to Axilus's word, the bus arrived after maybe three minutes, and despite the certain rarity of a krogan passenger, there was no issue with getting both Raik and Crux onboard. The only downside was that the bus was standing room only, which meant that for a good two minutes, Thie had to cling to a bar and try very desperately to keep his weight off of his leg through turns and bumps, a feat which he didn't quite have the upper body strength nor precognition capabilities to accomplish.

By the time they climbed off, he was limping again, and very close to either collapsing or screaming. Luckily for him, the krogan they'd picked up seemed to have a thing about carrying quarians around, and seconds after Thie made it off the bus, he was back in Raik's arms.

Axilus made an odd sound and Crux gave him a hard look which quickly shut him up. He coughed awkwardly instead and pointed down the walk, muttered, "Uh, this way," and started walking very quickly in that direction.

Thie was only even more thankful that he wasn't walking once they got to the apartment building, a towering complex of gleaming silver and blue and white, and the intimidating staircase that stood between them and their destination.

He stared up at the building, extending so far skywards that he couldn't even see the top. "Axilus, what floor are we going to?"

"Uh, the twenty-third."

"And I don't suppose there's an elevator?"

"Sorry."

Kel whimpered and tugged on Crux's arm. "I'll give you twenty credits?"

Crux gave him an odd look. "Only twenty?"

"That's, um, twenty more than I actually have..."

He heaved a heavy, exaggerated sigh and scooped the little quarian up. "You remind me of myself when I was a kid. This one's on the house. Don't make a habit or I'll charge a convenience fee."

"I won't!" Kel happily chirped, clinging to the enormous krogan as if his life depended on it. He seemed far too happy just for not having to climb a staircase, but Thie supposed he could sympathize. Those stairs looked horrific, especially for an injured quarian such as himself, though even if he wasn't injured, he bet he'd be just as enthused as Kel if he didn't have to climb them himself.

Axilus shook his head and headed for the first flight of stairs. "C'mon, you wimps, it isn't that bad."

"Says you," Thie retorted. "You're a turian, you're built for this shit. I'm a quarian; I'm made to work on a mostly-flat ship, not climb a tower in ten minutes."

"You don't have to be an apex predator to be able to climb stairs, Thie."

"No, but it certainly fucking helps."

* * *

The stairs were just as bad as Thie had anticipated, or maybe even worse. The constant jostling as Raik climbed flight after flight lit twin bonfires in his leg in spite of the fact that he wasn't the one doing the climbing at all, and by the time they reached the top, he'd finally given in and set his suit to dispense painkillers at regular intervals for the next couple hours, blissfully flooding his nervous system with a much-needed sensation of numbness, or, well, the lack of sensation entirely. The side-effect of this decision, which Thie had been weighing in his mind ever since they'd begun their little sojourn, happily knocked him right the fuck out, and he spent a good half of the climb lost in oblivion. He only woke up once they reached the top and Raik, with an amused little grumble, shook him awake.

"Rise and shine, princess," the krogan said in an oddly sunny tone of voice. "You don't wanna miss the party."

Thie shifted and blinked, blearily trying to clear up the disorientation. "Oh, uh... Sorry..." he mumbled, doing his damndest to sit up, then, failing that, just pulled his mask off and scrubbed at his eyes, ignoring Kel's shocked gasp. He was already sick, why give a damn? Besides, he was pretty sure Trebia's copious amounts of radiation killed most of what would make him sick anyway, so there was that, too. "How long was I out?"

"Eh. Six minutes, maybe." Crux shrugged, carefully depositing Kel on the ground before motioning to Thie's removed mask. "You sure that's a good idea?"

"No. But to hell with it."

Thie just finished fitting his mask back on when they arrived in front of the apartment. Or, well, it was probably the apartment, considering Axilus just kind of stopped and got trampled by a herd of krogan, something which probably wouldn't have happened if it wasn't the right apartment, but who knew with this kid. "This it?"

"Uh, yeah." Axilus composed himself, standing before the door, and raised a hand. Then he just kind of... hung there.

Thie waited for a minute. "... are you going to knock?"

"Yes."

"... anytime soon?"

"Yes."

"... are you sure?"

"Shut up, I'm scared."

He raised an eyebrow. "Why?"

Axilus whined a little. "My mom's terrifying, okay?"

"So you've said. Repeatedly."

"Well, it's true! I'm not supposed to be home for... for..." He stopped for a minute, the math apparently causing his brain to temporarily short out, then finished, "six months! I think? Or maybe it was four..." He paused long enough to contemplate the meaning of life and write a doctoral essay on it, then just shook his head. "She's just gonna be pissed at me, okay? And when my mom gets pissed, people die. Seriously, I've heard the stories. She's got a kill count in the hundreds-"

"Will you just knock on the damn door?" Thie interjected, shaking his head. "It's damn hot out here, and krogan aren't very comfortable seats. No offense."

"None taken."

"But-!"

"Do it, Madelivio." Thie gave Axilus his best glare.

Axilus whined. Then he just fluttered his mandibles, slumped, and turned back towards the door, raising his hand to knock-

And then the door slammed open and Axilus went flying into the railing with a turian almost his size wrapped around his midsection. Raik dropped Thie in surprise. Thie and Axilus both began screeching at about the same time, but for entirely different reasons.

"Axilus Madelivio, why didn't you fucking _call?!"_

"Raik Gemeng, why did you fucking _drop me_?!"

Axilus blinked, taking an extraordinarily long time to process exactly what just happened. Then he went stiff. "... I'm dead, aren't I?"

His mother let go and stood up to her full height, eyes narrowed. "Damn right you are. You are _so_ grounded for this, young man."

"But mom-!"

"Don't you 'but mom' me, I thought you were _dead!"_

"I- _what?"_

She crossed her arms, absolutely radiating disapproval. "Your CO called me two nights ago. Something about you being MIA following that last mission of yours. And then you just spontaneously appear at the front door after two days of radio silence? At least your brother had the decency to _call_ me before he fell through the front door, you just showed up with _krogan!"_

By then, Raik had picked Thie back up and found out that Thie no longer wanted to be held, and Thie had relocated himself to the railing, leaning heavily against it with a grimace. He was fully expecting to be ignored, but, alas, nothing could go his way, and the turian woman glared right at him, seething, "And what the _hell_ is with _this?_ I do _not_ need more quarians to take care of."

"Uh, _more?"_

A helmeted head peeked out from beyond the door, eyes wide as dinner plates. "Uh, ma'am?" she squeaked, eyes somehow growing larger. "What in... This isn't my fault!"

"I _know_ it's not _your_ fault," she growled at the tiny quarian (and how appropriate 'tiny' was; he'd never seen a shorter quarian on their Pilgrimage before). "Just go sit down, I doubt you'll make this any better." Then she stopped, sighed, and shook her head. "Sorry, that was rude. Just go sit down and I'll handle this."

The little quarian squeaked, "Okay," and vanished.

Then the turian woman turned and _glared_ at Thie. _"Explain."_

Thie wilted a bit, shifting his weight off of his injured leg again with a wince. "Uh, well..."

"It's my fault!" Axilus cut in. Then he stopped and looked very confused for a second, shook his head, and continued. "I got really excited to come home, I didn't exactly... think of whether or not you'd want me to bring home a crowd. Of krogan and quarians. Without calling you or giving you any warning whatsoever. Sorry, mom..." Then he stopped again and just looked bewildered. "Why is Tol home?"

"Later." She closed the door behind her and leaned against it, crossing her arms. "Give me some names so I don't look like a complete idiot, Ax."

"Uh, the brown krogan is Raik, the blue one is Crux, the blue quarian is Thie, and the tiny quarian- the guy one- is Kel." Ax fidgeted. "... Mom, why is there a quarian in the house?"

 _"Later,"_ she repeated, shaking her head. "My name is Sephira, you four may call me Mistress Actinus, I'm this idiot's mother, and I don't take kindly to strangers, so watch your mouths. Now explain."

Kel, thankfully for Thie, spoke up. "Axilus saved my friend, Thie, from the slaver ship, and same with Crux. I went on Pilgrimage with Thie and, well, I guess I was just really lucky I wasn't on the slaver ship, too. Raik, uh... is... my crewmate?"

"Close enough." Raik shrugged. He'd moved back near the railing, next to Crux, while Kel had drifted up by Axilus and his mother. Thie was perfectly content to remain exactly where he was. "Figured they could use a bodyguard in case those slavers tried to finish the job."

Sephira- Mistress Actinus, Thie corrected- looked from Kel to the krogan to Thie to Ax and back again a few times, then groaned and rubbed her forehead, grumbling, "I'm not nearly drunk enough to put up with this shit."

"Um..."

She sighed and shook her head, glancing back at Axilus. "And you didn't call me, _why?"_

"Because I'm an idiot who doesn't think about others," Axilus recited, shoulders drooping.

"Right. Oh, right, I have something for you."

Axilus perked up. "You do?"

"Yep." And half a second later, Axilus was on the ground and Miss Actinus was rubbing her hand and grimacing. "That's for being a moron and letting your _goddamn mother think you were dead_. Think about that next time."

Axilus whined.

Miss Actinus sarcastically imitated his whining and kicked him in the shoulder. "Get up, you wimp. I could have hit you a lot harder and you know it."

"It still hurt...!"

Thie blinked and glanced over at Kel, who gave him a helpless little shrug, then at Raik, who was looking over the railing in horror after a lingering _"See you next fall!"_ , then back to the two turians. This was anything _but_ how he'd expected this reunion to go.

Kel fidgeted a bit, then made a brave attempt to intervene. "Um, Miss Actinus-?"

"It's _Mistress."_ She whipped around to glare at Kel, relaxing a bit when she noticed it was just the tiny quarian and that he'd instantly started recoiling the second she'd turned. "I'm married. Give me some goddamn respect. Now, _what?"_

Kel fidgeted again, rather nervously, and meekly answered, "I was just going to ask if we could get out of the heat."

"Oh. Right." She shook her head and motioned towards the door. "Forgot you aren't used to it. Come on, you babies."

Ax ducked his head and hurried inside, pausing long enough next to his mother to tap his forehead against hers, followed by Kel and Raik, who was still staring shellshocked at the railing. Thie let go of the railing and managed to wobble a few steps towards the door before Miss Actinus rolled her eyes, muttered, "Oh, for _fuck's sake_ ," and helped him the rest of the way.

Once the four of them were assembled in the den (Miss Actinus looked around in mild confusion for a minute or two, mumbling about how she'd thought there had been _two_ krogan) and sorted out seating arrangements, with most thought going towards Thie and his injuries, Axilus's mother took her seat with a sigh. "Siri, you can come out now."

The tiny quarian from before puttered out from the kitchen, hovering anxiously nearby. She was a tiny little thing in a coal black suit, hardly reaching midway up Axilus's chest even if she stretched. She looked nervous, glancing about the room and twisting her hands together. "Um..."

Miss Actinus sighed and rubbed just behind her mandibles. "This is Siri'Yanna. I found her at work. Crash-landed on Palaven, been stranded in Cipritine for a few months. She's been helping me work."

Thie shifted, sitting up slowly and carefully as so to avoid jostling his aching leg again, and bowed his head. "Thie'Haasn nar Olyna. Thank you for giving us shelter."

"Kel'Raanis nar Anaid," Kel added, performing his best bow from his awkward position on the floor. "Pleased to meet you, Mistress Actinus."

"This is Raik Gemeng-" Thie motioned to the brown krogan standing stiffly near the door, "-and this is..." He trailed off and looked around, blinking. "Where's-?"

A knock on the door made nearly everyone present jump, and after a minute, at Miss Actinus's command, Siri hesitantly moved over and slowly pulled it open.

"Where have _you_ been?" Thie asked, raising an eyebrow.

Crux just grinned. "Oh, I went on a very nice trip." A very krogan snort resonated throughout the room, though Raik simply stared indifferently at whoever looked at him oddly for it. "May I come in?"

Miss Actinus's brow plates shot skywards, mandibles fluttering a bit. Apparently she'd been caught off-guard by the krogan's politeness, though if _that_ was what would get her about Crux, Thie dreaded to know how she'd respond to his constantly cracking dad jokes. "And you are?"

Crux gave an awkward little bow. "Gurdnau Crux, at your service."

She stared at him appraisingly for a minute, looking him up and down. Then she just sighed and rubbed behind her mandibles again. "All right, I'm _definitely_ not drunk enough for this. Ax, go get the beer from the bottom shelf. The acid yellow bottles."

"Just one?"

"No, bring me the whole damn case."

Axilus blinked, though he did as he was told, returning a minute later with a case of the strangest-looking beer Thie had ever seen in his life, as well as a few small, reddish-brown disks he eventually recognized to be some sort of cookie, mumbling, "I'm hungry," when his mother gave him a sharp look. Then he retook his seat at Thie's side, perching awkwardly halfway between the cushion and the armrest, where he proceeded to shove two of the cookies into his mouth at the same time. "So, are Grandma and Grandpa home?" he asked, mouth full. "There was a _lot_ of alcohol in the fridge." He swallowed, then grinned that weird turian smile and added, "And I don't think all of it was legal. Pretty sure I saw some ryncol in the back..."

"Shush." Miss Actinus rolled her eyes. "And surprise. Don't tell your father just yet, I don't feel like being bitched out over the comm right now."

"What was that about ryncol?" Crux lumbered into the room once Miss Actinus provided her permission, taking up a position just next to Raik, who elbowed him and gave him an odd sideways look to which he responded with a simple grin and a chuckle. "So, what did I miss?"

"Nothing, yet." Thie fidgeted with his arm's cast. He had a bad feeling about whatever was going to happen, though he didn't really think he'd be able to get away from the discussion with his body in the shape it was. Maybe he'd get lucky and she'd take everything at face value, let them go to sleep and recover...

But, alas, the galaxy hated Thie, and Miss Actinus popped open a beer and leaned back to stare lazily at him. "Start explaining. What the hell are you doing here, and why did you bring my son with you?"

Thie winced. He should have seen this discussion coming a mile away. "Uh, well, it's a long story..."

She took a long swig from the bottle grasped between her talons. "I've got the time."

Desperately, Thie looked to the others for help, and found none. Axilus fidgeted. Kel squirmed uncomfortably. Raik and Crux made twin disapproving sounds. With a heavy sigh, knowing that it was all left to him, Thie glanced back and withered under the turian woman's stern glare. "I... it really is a long story, and I'm... tired... Could we explain after some sleep?"

No such luck. Her glare only hardened.

He took a deep breath. Swallowed hard. Focused on breathing. In, out. In, out. "Did he tell you about the slaver ship? Or, well, it didn't have to be him, it could have been anyone, really..."

She didn't answer verbally, giving only a short nod he nearly missed in response.

"Oh, uh- okay, well, um..." He could feel something welling up in his chest, a cold, hard bubble that pressed against his lungs and made it difficult to think, let alone breathe. "I was... I was on that ship. In one of the holding cells. The slavers, they, uh... they... left me for dead, I guess... and- and if it hadn't been for your son, I would have..."

He broke off suddenly, breathing hard. The bubble had grown into a cold, hard stone weighing down every word and choking him with them. His head felt distant from his body and his mouth was full of cotton. His heartbeat pounded in his ears. He knew he needed to go on, to explain, to make her understand, but suddenly all he could think was _oh no I'm going to die I can't breathe can't breathe CAN'T BREATHE--_

And then there was a hand on his arm and his back and he was being gently pulled into a warm embrace, a soft, motherly voice above his head whispering to him in a language he knew he _should_ understand but just _couldn't._ Tears were running down his cheeks, he realized, and sometime during that moment of disconnect he'd curled up into a small ball, fingers digging into his helmet in a vain attempt to make it stop _just make it stop_. His entire body was quaking, his heart racing and mind and senses on full alert, too alert, too sensitive. Even the gentle touch fabric of his envirosuit against his skin burned. But he just couldn't bring himself to pull away from Miss Actinus's touch, even as surprised as he was to see the display of... was it affection? He couldn't be certain. He just leaned forward and closed his eyes and whimpered.

Nobody spoke for a long time. The silence was almost as deafening as the panicked mental _scream_ which had resonated through Thie's skull and shaken him down to his very bones just moments ago.

Then she very slowly let go, sitting back. Miss Actinus's pupils had blown wide and were just beginning to thin again, her eyes locked with Thie's as she asked, in as motherly a tone as Thie had ever heard, "Do you want to go somewhere else?"

He couldn't summon the words to respond, only nodded mutely, dropping his gaze to lock on his hands.

She took one of them, jolting him with surprise, and carefully led him to his feet. She didn't even flinch when he slumped tonelessly against him, just wrapped an arm around his shoulders. "Axilus, make sure no one does anything stupid while I'm gone."

Axilus snapped himself out of the open-mouthed trance he'd been staring at Thie in and nodded. "Uh, okay. Should I-?"

"No. You stay here. I'll take care of him." She shot him a hard look. Then she just turned and, careful as ever, led Thie down the narrow hallway branching from the den.

Thie didn't even look where they'd stopped once they did, only fell to the side and collapsed onto the so-conveniently placed bed just next to the door. He'd stopped shaking, but now, instead of all-encompassing terror, his head was fuzzy with exhaustion, even worse than he'd felt after the mess on the slaver ship. Even his eyelids felt like iron curtains, and he felt like he was spending far too much effort keeping them open to be worth it.

Miss Actinus chuckled and bent down, carefully picking Thie up off the bed. He was too tired to struggle, though he did notice that his earlier observation of her size did her no justice; the woman was just as tall as Axilus, maybe even _taller,_ which, while it normally would have been quite a shock, he just couldn't find the energy to be surprised with. "You'll just make your injuries worse sleeping like that," she said with that odd little turian smile he'd come to recognize. Then she just... left, the door swishing shut behind her.

The room was fucking hot as hell, and it took Thie a minute or two of painfully rolling back and forth to find a position where he didn't feel like he was going to wake up with sweat pooled on his visor upon waking after some rest. Then he closed his eyes and curled up a little, trying to ignore the heat and the throbbing in his leg, and after a while, managed to pass out. Somehow. He didn't know how and would never again be able to replicate such a feat on Palaven except with the aid of air conditioning, but he did it, and that's what mattered.

And then he woke up lying face-down and thought, _"I have made a terrible mistake."_

He ended up just taking his mask off before even bothering with trying to sit up, grimacing and tilting it to one side to let the copious pool of spit and drool empty onto the sheets. "This is why quarians sleep on their sides..." he grumbled, pulling up one sheet corner to scrub fruitlessly at the inside of the visor. Ew. This was going to take some serious work to dry out, and in the meantime, everything was just going to smell gross.

Fuck.

This week was going to shit already, and it was only Monday.

He made a mental note to inform Miss Actinus about the mess after he struggled his way to his feet, leaning heavily against the wall. Oh well. Not his house, not his problem. They'd probably be long gone before she even noticed.

He hoped.

Oh Keelah, this was a _big_ mistake.

Limping down the hall took a while, as he'd apparently forgotten how to walk during his little nap and nearly fell so many times that he'd just stopped counting. And by the time he'd gotten back to the den, he really just wished he hadn't even gotten up.

"... Kel, what the _fuck_ is going on?" he asked, raising an eyebrow at the taller of the two tiny quarians standing off to the side, by the kitchen.

Kel shrugged. "Uh... I think the krogan challenged Miss Actinus to a brawl." He was quiet for a minute, then added, "They're really making a mess. I hope I don't have to help clean this up, I had nothing to do with it."

"Axilus?"

The turian was standing in the kitchen, holding one of the acid yellow bottles of beer he'd given to his mother early on, and answered with a mere shrug. "My mom is kinda... aggressive, I think is the word. And she likes fighting. You can ask the guy who wouldn't stop hitting on her until she faked being pregnant. Actually, don't, she might try to kill you for associating with him."

"But..." Thie stopped and sighed, shaking his head and wishing his mask wasn't there so he could rub his temples. "Your mother is fighting a pair of krogan. Inside the apartment. Trashing the living room. Shouldn't we be concerned about this, or something?"

"About the krogan, maybe."

He stared.

Axilus shrugged. "I keep telling you, my mom is _terrifying."_

One of the krogan- Crux, Thie thought, but he couldn't get a decent glimpse of the plates, so who the fuck knew- made a rather amusing (and hilariously monotone) _"huraaaagh"_ noise and went sailing past the gaggle of quarians and into the kitchen, tumbling across the floor like a rag doll. He popped back up in an instant and bared his teeth in a grin, letting out a hearty laugh. "I _like_ this woman!"

Axilus blinked at Thie. "She's winning," he stated matter-of-factly.

Thie gritted his teeth. "I noticed. Your point is proven. Good job, you fucktard."

The other krogan, who Thie was pretty sure was Raik, skidded to a stop very close to the female quarian's legs, and she looked as though she might faint, making a sad little "eep!" noise and skipping away a step. Then he sat up, stood, and dusted himself off before glancing at Thie and shrugging rather nonchalantly. "Don't ask."

"Can we take _her_ with us?" Crux bounded up beside Raik, still wearing that stupid grin. "I _like_ her! Reminds me of my first girlfriend!"

Axilus made a rather disturbed bird noise behind them.

Crux laughed. "I kid, I kid. She reminds me of my sister's girlfriend."

"I don't want to know."

"No, you don't. I'll tell you anyway once we're back at the ship."

"Is your sister dating a thresher maw?" Kel asked very seriously and rather suddenly, looking quite curious. Crux didn't answer, just burst into laughter so hard he went down on one knee.

Miss Actinus chose that moment of all times to approach the group, looking absolutely no worse for wear, and in fact seeming rather amused. "Thank you for the compliment, little bird." Then she looked between the two krogan, completely unfazed by the fact that one of them was currently doubled over in hysterics, and nodded appreciatively. "Thank you for the fight. Best one I've had in ages, and first time I didn't break someone's leg or crest. I'm impressed."

Axilus looked terrified for about half a second before asking, rather incredulously, "You broke peoples' _crests?!"_

His mother beamed. "Damn straight I did. I had a running record of twenty by the time administration made me cut it out."

"Administration? When the fuck was this?"

"Boot camp."

Thie stared at her, then slowly shook his head and turned around. "I'm going back to bed before I catch the crazy," he mumbled, trying very hard to ignore Crux's continuing laughter from behind him. Keelah, he knew krogan had two sets of lungs, but he'd been going for _ages._ Surely even krogan needed to take a breath every once in a while.

And then he was face-to-face with yet another turian.

He fell flat on his ass in his surprise.

The turian blinked at him, then slowly looked up at Miss Actinus and asked, in the saddest, most pathetic tone Thie had ever heard, "Mom, what the _fuck...?"_

"Good morning, Tollak," Miss Actinus almost literally chirped, sounding far too cheerful for having just come out of a fight with _two goddamn krogan at once_. "You're up early."

"Early? It's almost suppertime!"

"Shut up, Axilus." She gave Axilus a hard look, then glanced back at the newcomer, mandibles fluttering a bit. "You don't look well. Go back to bed, Tol, I'll fill you in in the morning."

Tollak blinked at her for a moment, what she'd just said apparently filtering across his consciousness at a snail's pace. Then he slowly nodded. "Yeah... okay... g'night..." And he turned around and very slowly, very clumsily made his way back down the hall to a room which Thie _knew_ had been locked before.

Everyone remained dead silent until the holographic lock blinked red. Then Axilus echoed his brother with a, "Mom, what the _fuck?!"_

"Your brother was sent home early, Axilus." Miss Actinus rolled her eyes, mandibles clacking against the plating behind her jaw. "You know he's not built like you are. He got sent back _officially_ for a sprain, but they told me over the comm it's for fatigue. Passed out doing laps. Bad sign."

"But-" Axilus seemed to have trouble thinking of words, standing there with his mouth open and mandibles fluttering madly for a minute before continuing, "You could've _said_ something! I mean, I thought he was back for leave, not at fucking home!"

"First of all, don't yell at me, boy. Second, I was _going_ to tell you." She folded her arms in front of her and shrugged. "And then I got in a fight with two krogan and won. Can you blame me for letting it slip my mind?"

Axilus just stared at her for a minute. Thie was afraid his brain had shorted out, but then he started motioning down the hall and making a series of confused bird noises which he eventually translated as, _"What the shit, Mom?!"_

"Just let your brother sleep."

Then Axilus found his words. "I would have if I'd known he was fucking there!"

 _"Ugh._ Look, just shut up and drink your beer, okay? I forgot. Big fucking deal." Miss Actinus huffed, hard enough that her nasal plates rattled, and spun on her... heel? to head back towards the den. "Come on, we're not done talking yet."

"Technically we are," Raik cut in, and she paused and turned around so quickly, Thie winced. Raik wasn't fazed. "You're the one who wanted to stop talking and start fighting. Plus, we've gone over everything already, so unless you want to discuss the fine details of quarian dietary habits, I think we're about done."

Miss Actinus blinked slowly at Raik.

Raik blinked slowly back.

Then she huffed. "Fine. Then get out the goddamn ryncol, I'm not nearly drunk enough for the conversation I know you idiots are about to start."

"Uh, conversation?" Thie was glad Kel could speak; he'd found himself rather surprisingly muted by the strange things he'd been witnessing in the past few minutes.

"You know, the _'can we stay here because we have nowhere else to go'_ conversation. The one where you try to guilt-trip me into letting two more quarians and a pair of krogan spend the night here when there is _no fucking way in hell_ I can do that."

"Why not?"

"Because my parents are here, I already have _one_ quarian to take care of," Siri flinched a little, but Miss Actinus either didn't notice or didn't care, "and my husband is going to flip his shit so hard I'm pretty sure he's going to do a triple fucking pirouette of the goddamn balcony and earn the fuckin' Galactic Gold in acrobatics once he gets back and finds out that _not only_ is there a quarian hanging around but _both of his sons_ are home more than _three months_ earlier than they were _supposed_ to be." She huffed, then added, "Plus, he doesn't like my parents and my dad fuckin' hates his guts, so there's that, too."

Axilus fidgeted, then quietly, almost meekly asked, "But I thought Dad liked Grandma...?"

"He does. She's just evil by association."

Thie shook his head, finally finding his voice in time to say, "I do _not_ want to know."

"You really don't." Miss Actinus just huffed and shook her head. "Look, I know you guys need someplace to go while you're in town. And I'd love to help. I really would. But in case you haven't noticed, this apartment is hardly enough for four turians- hell, it _isn't_ enough, but we make do. There's just no way we can fit two krogan and two more quarians in here, the place would fucking explode and I'd be the one paying for the mess."

"But, Mom!" Axilus clasped his hands together, which was a goddamn strange sight for something with talons like him. _"Please!_ Just for one night! Tell Grandma and Grandpa you need one more day, they can't say no to you unless it's about boys!"

"Axilus, you _know_ that won't work-"

"Tell them that both of your sons were sent home on the same night," Thie interrupted, trying not to flinch when Miss Actinus predictably glared him down. "Tell them the one- uh, Tollak, right?- was sent home injured, and Axilus has PTSD. Tell them you need one more day to make sure they're comfortable before you put them in a crowd and expect them to function like normal. If they're decent people, they'll understand."

Miss Actinus exhaled sharply and loudly in an almost krogan-sounding snort. Thie found himself wondering if all that bragging about having krogan blood Axilus had done really had some credence, and flinched when she finally spoke, after a long pause, and said, "That should work."

He tried not to sound surprise. "It should?"

She nodded. "We're turians," she stated, "and we've had this sort of shit ground into our heads since childhood. We're told not to strain the injured; they ought to listen if I tell them the boys need some more time. It'll at least give us some time to work out where the fuck to send you five."

"Um, five?" Siri's voice was quiet, almost lost amidst the background noise of mumbling and shuffling that filled the tiny room. But Miss Actinus didn't miss it.

"I'm sorry, Siri'Yanna, but this apartment just isn't large enough for me to support you, too." She nodded shortly to the tiny quarian, not even flinching when she visibly drooped. "We'll have to find you someplace else to stay, but that can wait until after these four get a place of their own for now."

"I-" The little quarian sighed, fidgeting hands falling to her sides, and she shrugged and tried, in vain, to sound more upbeat. "Okay. Thank you, Mistress Actinus. I appreciate the thought."

Miss Actinus nodded sharply. "Good. Well, then. Now that that's sorted, we have something else to tackle." She flicked one mandible toward the window, which had a perfect view of the setting sun framed behind towering buildings of glowing reds and oranges and grays. "I'll leave you kids to figure out sleeping arrangements. I have a message to craft."

About five minutes later, the three quarians were left standing awkwardly in the den by themselves while the krogan happily lumbered off to the tiny balcony located just off the kitchen, perfectly content to spend the night sunning themselves in what remained of Trebia's copious amounts of radiation and UV. Axilus lingered by the hallway, as if unsure whether or not he should leave.

"You can leave, Axilus," Thie eventually said, shaking his head. "We're not going to die if you aren't looking at us for ten seconds."

"Says the one who almost died."

"Fuck off, Madelivio."

Axilus whined a little, then turned to leave just as something occurred to Thie. "Wait a second, hold on."

"Geez, make up your mind," he complained, though he complied, turned around, and patiently waited with a brow plate raised. "What?"

Thie gave him a sideways look. "When the hell did you meet Saren Arterius?" Kel perked up immediately, but Thie managed to shush him in time to avoid the imminent rant about the inherent awesomeness of all things Spectre.

Axilus hesitated. Then he shrugged. "Didn't."

"Then how the fuck did you get his autograph?"

"My... mom... has connections,"' the turian lamely finished. "It's probably better if you don't ask, kind of a long story..."

Thie snorted. "Whenever you say something is a long story, that's because you just don't want to tell it."

"That is true."

"You've lied about it the past couple times."

"That is also true."

"So why should I believe you now?" Thie crossed his arms, arching an eyebrow. See the goddamn turian come up with an excuse for _this_ one.

"Because it starts about..." Axilus paused and counted off on his fingers. "Twenty-five years ago, give or take a few months. But if you _really_ want to hear it..."

"No, no, thanks." Thie held up a hand. "I'd rather not. You win, Madelivio. Go the fuck to sleep."

Axilus whined. Thie did his best imitation of Miss Actinus's voice the last time she'd talked down to Axilus. "Go, Axilus." Then he switched to his normal voice, albeit a much more smug tone. "Or I'll tell your mother."

Axilus visibly paled, a true feat considering the plates, and vanished.

Siri fidgeted. "Um... Nice to meet you?"

"Yeah, let's save the introductions for when we're _not_ exhausted."

* * *

Thie was renowned for being one of the galaxy's lightest sleepers, even among quarians, who had to be light sleepers in order to keep up with the demands of their patchworked ships. He often found himself being awakened by the sound of the drive core skipping or one of the many old bits and pieces misfiring or misaligning and setting off an alarm until either a VI or a quarian dragged themselves over to fix it, even when the same thing had gone entirely unnoticed by Kel, and even when they were sleeping in the same quarters. He was used to it, to being awakened by just about everything.

Except a gigantic screaming turian standing over him at 0100.

His first thought was that of strangling Axilus for daring to wake him up because he stubbed his toe. Then he remembered that turians didn't _have_ toes, or at least not fleshy ones that could be stubbed easily, and woke up immediately.

The turian standing over him looked very much the same as Axilus. Impossibly tall, with the same bulky plating he'd seen on so many male turians, the same reddish-brown coloration, the same--

Wait a fucking minute.

Hold the goddamn phone.

Axilus didn't have blue eyes.

He froze. Beside him, Kel had woken up sometime before him and curled up in a tiny ball at the edge of the couch, quivering, and Siri had done much the same, although she'd added an extra step in and fallen completely off the couch in her fright. He was just about to consider screaming back when a white blur dove over the top of the couch and slammed into the turian at Mach 1, sending them both flying into the wall opposite them.

By the time he came back to his senses, Miss Actinus was sitting on her husband's chest and screaming at him for waking her up at _oh-fucking-one-hundred in the goddamn morning_ and _why the everliving fuck are you still in your fucking armor you FUCKING SHIT ON A FUCKSTICK_.

He sat up and barely had time to register that he was suddenly being lifted up before he was in one of the krogan's arms again, being carried out to the balcony and away from the screaming. Whichever one was holding him plopped him down and growled, _"Stay,"_ before vanishing off into the realm of rigorous _"FUCKING FUCK FUCK SHIT FUCK DAMN FUCK SHITTING FUCK"_ again, and Thie found himself staring in confusion at the other two quarians.

"What... just happened?" Kel asked, bewildered. Beside him, Siri just whimpered.

"I have no fuckin' clue," Thie admitted, "and I have no intention of going back in there to find out." Because holy _shit._ He'd heard stories, but having a turian scream at you in person was fucking _terrifying._

They sat there for about ten minutes, probably longer than needed considering the screaming stopped after about two. And the only reason they even went back in was the krogan, who picked them up and carried them inside like ragdolls that had been left out in the rain. The two turians were absolutely nowhere to be seen, though Thie had an idea of where they'd gone, judging from the rather... _exotic_ sounds emanating from down the hall. He grimaced and wondered how in the everliving fuck Axilus managed to sleep through it.

Then Crux unceremoniously dumped Siri and Kel on the floor, and Raik (surprisingly gently) placed Thie down on the couch, and both krogan vanished without another word.  
The quarians exchanged another look, shocked into silence which lasted for a good, long time as they tried to figure out just what the _fuck._

Then Siri broke the silence, her voice cracking as she suggested, "Maybe... we should just go to bed."

"And pray to the ancestors that it doesn't happen again," Kel added.

"Yeah..." Thie nodded, still rather stunned. "Let's... just do that."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The plot thickens! A new character is introduced and the crew meets the parents! And first impressions aren't quite as good as one would hope...
> 
> Expect more of Axilus's parents in the next couple chapters! They're there all the way until Chapter 14, if memory serves. ;D
> 
> Anyway!
> 
> So, thanks to my datemate, I now have an outline to follow for this fic! :D That means I SHOULD be updating more, PLUS you get more to each chapter because I'm going with my outline instead of just following whatever the fuck my brain comes up with!
> 
> That also means that HOLY SHIT are these chapters getting longer. I apologize greatly for this chapter being basically double that of any of the others. Consider it me making up for not updating for so long?


	10. Instant Existential Crisis, Just Add Krogan

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The next several chapters are going to be VERY headcanon-heavy. If you don't like extended world-building, consider this your advance warning!

Thie woke up to a dark apartment and quiet shuffling.

He was still for a long moment, hardly even breathing, eyes clenched closed to keep their faint glow from giving him away as he focused his ears on the sound, trying to pinpoint its source. He could tell that whoever it was was in the kitchen by the direction, and that it was most definitely a turian by the quiet clicking of toeclaws against the tiled flooring. That narrowed it down to Axilus, his brother, his mother, or his father, the screaming brute who'd violently awakened him the night before and scared another half of his lifespan away. He desperately hoped it was Axilus. The others either didn't seem to like him or didn't seem to give half a shit either way about him, and he decided he'd much prefer someone who actually cared about how he felt.

Whoever it was didn't sound like they'd be coming closer anytime soon, so Thie allowed his eyes to slowly peek open, watching the shadows through dimly-illuminated lashes for a moment before sitting up, carefully so he didn't rouse either of the two quarians slumbering on at either side. Extracting himself from between them took quite some time, doing so with a broken leg and arm even longer, and doing so _quietly_ so long that he nearly gave up.

Once he was finally back up on his feet, he shifted his weight from his wounded leg and hesitated for only a moment before setting his suit to dispense a low dose of painkillers every half hour, hoping that small deterrent would keep his leg's ache at bay.

Then, as quietly as he could, he made his way to the kitchen and peered around the corner, steeling himself for whatever could, and certainly would, happen.

A soft, feminine voice inhaled sharply in surprise, pearl white plates almost glowing in the soft moonlight streaming through the windows. "Spirits, you startled me!" Miss Actinus hissed, her voice low. "What are you doing awake?"

Thie blinked several times and had to remind himself to keep his voice down in his surprise. "I- Mistress Actinus?"

"Of course it's me." Even as dim as it was, Thie could see her roll her eyes. "Who else would be making tea at 0400? Certainly not the boys, they're lazy as rocks." She paused. "I didn't know quarian eyes glowed at night."

"I, um." He blinked a few times and shrugged awkwardly. "They, um, they say our eyes glow because our blood glows. It's very faint, hardly visible during the day, which I guess is why no one really... notices."

"Huh." She looked him up and down as if appraising him. "Whatever. Makes sense enough to me." Then she turned back. "If you're going to be staying up, I could use a hand."

"What are you doing?" he asked, curiously drifting to her side.

"Making tea," she replied simply. _"Demipal_ tea, to be specific."

He raised an eyebrow. "What's a _demipal?"_

"It's a breed of tree. Grows along riverbeds near the equator, mostly. Went to basic near a huge grove of them. Quite peaceful. Damn good sniper perches, too. They say if you're quiet, you can hear the spirits playing in the leaves."

Thie raised the other eyebrow. He was starting to see where Axilus got his talent for rambling. "And what does that have to do with anything?"

Miss Actinus rolled her eyes. _"Demipal_ are associated with peace and tranquility. Especially since there's a chemical in the leaves that's very good for anxiety. Thought you could use them. I prefer _escori_ tea, myself, but I've only got the one kettle."

His eyebrows came back down immediately, furrowing. Then he shook his head. "Wait, you're making tea for me?"

"Well, yes." She spared him a glance out of the corner of her eye. "You were a downright mess yesterday. I have damn good people senses-- not just hot air, mind you, I've been told this over and over my whole life-- and they were ringing all the maternal alarm bells, telling me you needed help." She shrugged and looked back at the kettle. "So I'm doing what I do best. I'm making tea."

Silence descended over them after that, and for a moment, Thie considered sneaking back to the other two quarians and lying down again. Then Miss Actinus spoke again.

"I can teach you how to make it, you know," she said, almost nonchalant. "It's really quite easy. All you need is water and the bark of the _demipal_ tree." Her mandibles fluttered. "But only if you want weak-ass tea. If you want tea as strong as a krogan-- that's the only good way to have it, mind you-- you need _hicrima_ and _parvesis._ Best damn tea you'll ever have."

Thie blinked. His translator hadn't quite caught a few of those words, and as a result, he had absolutely no fuckin' clue what she'd just said to add to make good tea.

Fortunately for him, she was damn good at reading posture, because she sighed and offered, "You want a translation?"

"Yes, please."

Miss Actinus cracked a small smile. _"Hicrima_ is sort of like... milk, I guess is the human term. Thick and creamy, very good for building up plates as a child. One of the best non-sugar sweets you'll ever taste, if you like that sort of thing. _Parvesis_ is a sort of crystal food source made by the _nevescelet,_ a kind of Palavenian insect born from nightmares and fed by fear, for their young. Very tart on its own, but very good for _demipal_ tea so long as you add it with _hicrima._ Otherwise, you're in for a nasty surprise."

Thie decided he didn't want to ask what she meant by "born from nightmares and fed by fear", instead opting to lean awkwardly against the counter at his side. "How does that help anything?"

"Demipal is, by nature, tart and really fuckin' weak. You want to taste anything, you've got to add something to it."

Thie blinked slowly. "... and what does 'tart' taste like?"

"Oh, for the love of-" She turned to him and gave him a very odd look. "You don't even- Oh, right, _quarian._ Ugh." Then she shook her head. "Tart is... well, it's tart. I guess it's... sharp, sort of? Uh... Spirits, I'm not a words person, how about you just figure it out for yourself and we call it good?"

"Uh... okay. I'll just take your word for it."

"Good." She turned back to the kettle, which had begun to hiss quietly. "Hand me the white jar over there, will you?" Thie obliged and she took it, tugging the round top off with a little _'thoonk',_ and removed a handful of a thin, faintly bronze, papery substance which Thie assumed to be the _demipal_ bark, showing it to him. "See, you only need about a handful for a full kettle, and maybe two pinches for a cup. It's damn weak, but it's not _that_ weak." Her mandibles fluttered and she took another small kettle from somewhere beyond Thie's visual range, carefully settling the bark down in the bottom. "Then you just put the bark down in the bottom of your kettle-- this is a steeping kettle, for the record, I wasn't lying when I said I only had one-- and..." She lifted the kettle of boiling water and carefully poured a steaming stream into the steeping kettle. "... just pour it in. Fill it up most of the way, but leave about an inch at the top for good measure. Then just cover it and let it sit for a few minutes."

She turned to Thie, spreading her mandibles in that weird grin he'd become so used to from turians. "Really simple. But if you ask the boys to do it, the only one who can without burning the water is Axilus."

A strange, sort of bitter smell filled the room, and Thie paused, gears working as he tried to sort out exactly what the smell _was._ "Is that what the tea will taste like?"

"Maybe. You quarians are weird, I have no fuckin' clue if you're smelling what I'm smelling." Damn apex predators and their over-sensitive senses. "But it'll probably be pretty close. That's why we add other things to it." That damn smile grew wider. "But if it's too bitter for you, there's always more things we could add."

"Like...?" He wouldn't admit it, but he was a bit apprehensive about whatever she was going to tell him next. He didn't think his head could handle this many new terms in one morning.

"Like _mellicar."_ One of her mandibles fluttered lightly and she looked back to the kettle again. "Comes from the _opericul_ plant. The roots are used for _opericul_ tea and the leaves for _mellicar_ syrup, which is a pretty mild sweetener. Real nice, to be honest. Better than the tea, but maybe that's because most turians don't exactly like stupidly sweet shit." She held up a small bottle of viscous, blue-violet liquid. "That's this. Then there's this." She put down the bottle and held up a small canister, popping the top off to show a faintly-blue powder, the sickeningly sweet smell of which immediately clogged Thie's olfactory filters and made him gag. He heard her chuckle and did his best not to growl, because that would be bad for his health. "The plant produces this around pollination season. It's ten times stronger than the syrup. We call it 'sweet _mellicar',_ the greatest example of an understatement in turian history."

From down the hall, Thie heard a faint, "Sephira, I smell _mellicar,_ what the fuck are you doing to that poor tea?!"

"Nothing, Aephis," Miss Actinus responded, unfazed. "Go back to bed, sweetie." Then she glanced over at Thie and chuckled a bit at the stricken expression on his face. "That's Aephis. Also known as, the big dumb idiot who crashed through the front door at 0100 and screamed at the top of his lungs because he was too tired to recognize that you were quarians, not a herd of random turians, and I wasn't cheating." She shook her head. "Spirits, I love him."

"... uh-huh." Thie just blinked very slowly, flinching when he heard the sound of toeclaws clicking on the tiling behind him. He contemplated turning around, but when he heard a sharp, mildly angry inhale, he very quickly changed his mind.

Miss Actinus didn't even flinch. "I thought I told you to go back to bed, you moron. Bed is back down the hall, not in the kitchen."

"I smelled tea," the turian tersely replied, stiffly marching to Miss Actinus's side to brush their cheeks together. "And whenever I sleep in, you just leave me the dregs."

"Uh-huh. If you yell at this poor kid again, I'm throwing you off the balcony."

"Love you too, honey." He grumbled and turned to stare at Thie, giving him a look which very quickly made him very uncomfortable. "Major Aephis Madelivio. But you can call me 'sir'."

Thie stammered a little, trying to find words, and all he could pull together was a lame, "Hello, sir."

Aephis grumbled and turned back to the tea, inhaling deeply. Then he went rigid, turned to Miss Actinus with fire in his eyes, and hissed, _"Krogan?!_ What the _fuck,_ Seph!? I'm gone for two weeks!"

She just mildly pointed at Thie. "Blame him and your sons. Oh, by the way, they're home too."

Aephis made various sounds of distress and anger for a moment, then stomped out of the kitchen and glared out onto the balcony, where two mounds of krogan continued to snooze on. Then he stormed back. "When the fuck did the kids get home."

"Tol got back three days ago. Medical leave. You know how he is." She shrugged. "Ax just popped up last night with two krogan and two quarians hanging out with him."

"And why the _fuck_ do you smell like the krogan?"

"I may or may not have gotten into a brawl with them and whipped their asses," she smugly replied.

Aephis stared blankly at her for a moment, mood immediately performing a perfect 180-degree turn. "... we need to have sex immediately. Holy shit, Seph." He turned to Thie, who shrunk back a bit, and asked, "Is she telling the truth?" When he nodded mutely, he whistled-- how, Thie had absolutely no clue, considering turians didn't actually have lips. "Ho-lee- _shit,_ Seph."

Miss Actinus just blandly replied, "Hold on to your head, there, Aephis. That whiplash might tear it off," and continued making tea.

Aephis made the galaxy's strangest almost-purr noise and nuzzled just behind Miss Actinus's- Sephira's?- mandibles. "We are having sex immediately. This is cause for a fuckin' celebration, Seph. Like, holy shit. You didn't happen to kill anyone, did you? Such as, oh, I don't know, the neighbor downstairs?"

"Sadly, no."

"Aw, fuck."

"Aephis," she suddenly said, giving him a hard look. "Did you ever clean up your armor from last night?"

Aephis considered. Then his mandibles drooped.

"I thought so. Get to it."

Aephis whined.

Sephira glared at him.

A few minutes later, it was just Thie and Sephira in the kitchen again, with the sound of grumpy mumbling coming from somewhere near the front door as Aephis grouchily cleared up his armor.

"I love him," Sephira said, checking the tea, "I really do. But he's such a goddamn slob. Tea's ready. Can you get me two-- three cups?" Thie obliged, and she carefully poured each halfway full with a warm bronze liquid which smelled like a very strange blend of bitter roots and eezo fumes and steamed up Thie's visor the second he leaned over to watch. Then she pointed to a cabinet by Thie's head. "Reach in there and grab the short jar, the one with the red top. That's the _parvesis._ And the _hicrima_ is in the fridge. Top shelf, white bottle."

Thie obliged, handing her the jar of _parvesis_ before wobbling to the fridge as directed. He pulled it open, then just stared. "That is... a lot of food."

"Welcome to somewhere that isn't the Fleet, kiddo. And welcome to a turian home." She shook her head. "With two boys and an adult manchild in the house, I have to keep an overstock."

"I am not a manchild!" Aephis hollered from down the hall.

Sephira rolled her eyes. "Yes, yes you are, dear. Shut up and deal with it. Kid-- ah, what's your name again?"

Thie blinked slowly and quietly replied, "Thie."

"Thie, then. Can you hand me the _hicrima_ already, before this gets cold?"

He hurriedly obliged, and she took the bottle and poured just a small amount into each mug. The _parvesis_ was nowhere to be seen, and he assumed she'd finished with it while his back had been turned. Too bad, because he was curious what a "crystal food source" looked like. Then, once he'd put the bottle back, he turned around and was quite spooked to find Sephira suddenly very close to him, offering him a cup.

She blinked slowly at him. "You startle too easily. This'll be good for you. Here, drink up. I already found you a straw and everything."

"Induction port," Thie corrected under his breath, taking the mug. He ignored Sephira's strange look and instead quietly thanked her, then turned around to sit down.

Alas, the galaxy still had a thing for him, because he turned around and nearly dropped his tea on the tiny little quarian female who'd suddenly appeared at his elbow. He yelped, she squeaked, and Sephira loudly sighed.

"Good morning, Siri," came Sephira's weary response to the little episode. She looked down at the quarian who had suddenly attached herself to her hip, very slowly trying to shake her off. "I suppose you want some tea, too." Then she raised her head and sighed before calling, "Aephis?"

Aephis reappeared in seconds, staring incredulously at the scene before him. "I... they multiplied."

"This is Siri. And no, quarians do not reproduce by asexual reproduction, she's been here longer than either of the boys this time around." She finally succeeded in shaking Siri off and sighed, holding out a cup of tea. "Here. Take this before I dump it down her cowl."

"Quarians don't have..."

"The hood," she clarified.

"Oh." He took the cup and stared at it, then sniffed it. "Why did you make _demipal?"_

"I'm not explaining this again."

"Fine, fine." He made a face at her. "Do I need to go wake up the krogan?"

She shook her head. "Oh no, believe me, you don't. I'm pretty sure they were up before I was."

"They were?"

"Yeah. Someone stole all the ryncol."

"Aww..." Aephis looked crushed. "There was ryncol and I don't even get any?"

Sephira sighed loudly. "I'll buy you a bottle when I go shopping today, okay? Go sit down and drink your tea. And try not to wake up-" She broke off, mandibles drooping in irritation. "-the other quarian. Good morning, kid-who-I-don't-remember-the-name-of."

"Good morning!" Kel chirped from his position near the table, sounding far too cheery for the hour it was. Thie pulled up the clock display on his mask and grimaced at the sight of the large, glowing 0450 in the corner of his right eye. _Far_ too early for this sort of shit. Kel leaned against the table, sniffing the air. "Mmm. Something smells nice."

Thie mutely held up his mug of tea, then began the struggle of threading the given straw through the small port located on the underside of his mask. It took more time than he'd have liked, but he succeeded and managed to take a small sip of tea, pleasantly delighted by the taste. _'So_ that's _what tart tastes like,'_ he thought to himself. It was quite good. While he was thinking about it, he pulled up his omni-tool and quickly noted down the instructions Sephira had provided him. They would come in handy later.

Kel stared at him for a moment, then cocked his head. "Is it tea?"

Sephira sighed heavily. "Yes, and I only made enough for two. It shouldn't have made three cups, but it did. If you want some, you can ask your friend here, I told him how to do it." Thie looked up in alarm. "It probably won't be as good since he's new to it, but hell."

Aephis looked around the growing cluster of people in irritation. "Maybe I should just get the boys up, complete the party," he grumbled, mandibles clacking against his jaw in irritation.

"Don't you dare." Sephira fixed him with a hard stare. "Tollak is home for fatigue and Axilus is an insomniac, it's a _miracle_ he's sleeping at _all._ If you _dare_ interrupt them, I'll shove your head up your ass, crest first."

"Ow." Aephis winced and placed a hand on his keelbone. "I'm wounded, Seph."

"Not yet. But you will be if you dare wake up my sons." Sephira's glare was a burning laser at this point. Thie was surprised Aephis didn't burst into flames. "Now go make breakfast."

"What?" Aephis looked surprised, and Thie couldn't blame him. He hadn't seen _that_ coming. "But- Seph, you're the- but why-"

"Because if you don't," Sephira interrupted, "my offer from earlier still stands. And I'll shove my foot up your ass after your head."

Aephis winced again and whined, "What the hell did I _do?"_

Sephira looked downright murderous. "You woke me up at _oh-one-fucking-hundred_ by _screaming your goddamn mandibles off,_ Aephis. Get your ass to the oven before I fucking kick it there." She started past him, then stopped and jabbed a talon into his keelbone, making him wince. "Oh, and by the way, I know your armor was fucking filthy last night. So you get to clean that up, too."

"Aw, but Seph-!"

Sephira gave him a blazing, razor-sharp look. Aephis shut up and wilted, mumbling, "Yes, dear."

Thie sidled past the two of them and leaned heavily against the table, wincing. His leg had been aching like a bitch ever since he'd gotten up two nights ago, and the only reason he could think of was that maybe the sedatives the turian medbay had given him had finally diluted enough that they wouldn't do anything. He set his suit to release more painkillers over the next hour or so, hoping that dose would be enough to tide him over until he could just sit down and stay down for a while, then glanced over at Kel, switching off his external speakers and opening a private comm line. "Morning."

"Morning!" Kel chirped. Even through the mask, Thie could tell that he was _way too goddamn happy_ , which was what Thie both liked and hated about the kid. Chipper as fuck, even when you didn't want him to be. Good ol' Kel. "Your leg okay? You've been favoring it an awful lot."

"Yeah, mostly." He gave it an irritated look. "I think the turian sedatives I got back on the station wore off, and my suit's painkillers just don't have the same kick. It's been hurting like a bitch ever since I passed out in Engineering. Ancestors know what I did to it while I was asleep."

"Shouldn't you get it checked out?"

"Where?" He gave Kel a Look. "We're on Palaven. Nobody here is going to want to take a look at a quarian, much less a quarian with no money and a broken leg. They don't care. Besides, I'll be fine."

"That's what you said the last time your implant overheated." Kel's eyes narrowed slightly behind his mask, and Thie could just envision the slight frown and concerned crease between his eyebrows. "And then it turned out it got rattled real bad and you had to keep it offline for a week so it didn't kill you. Remember that?"

"Yes, and I was fine, wasn't I? It just took some time, just like everything else." He huffed and glanced back at the quietly-bickering turians and the tiny quarian hovering nervously at Sephira's elbow, looking both like she wanted nothing more than to be anywhere else and like she didn't want to be anywhere but there at the same time. "Besides, we're giving them enough trouble. The last thing they need to worry about is a crippled quarian, and _especially_ one that needs a doctor. I don't have money for the costs, so they'd have to cover it, just like they'll have to cover everything else we need. There's already too much. If I bring up my leg, they'll probably kick us out."

"You don't think they're _that_ cruel, do you?"

Thie gave a short, humorless laugh, switching off his olfactory filters once they began to pick up whatever Aephis was making to hopefully quell his growing nausea. It was strange, normally smelling turian food didn't do this to him. He was just glad he could seal out that sort of thing, make life a bit easier on himself. "We're a burden, Kel. To the whole galaxy. To them, it isn't cruel, it's life."

Kel grabbed Thie's shoulder and made him turn to look at him, then motioned to Siri. His tone grew sharp, harsh, something which never happened with Kel. "Mistress Actinus has been taking care of her for two weeks now. You heard what she said. And if she could help just one quarian for two weeks, why can't she help us for just two days?" His voice softened. "Thie, she won't turn you away if you need help. If you're worried about Major Madelivio, don't. She can keep him in line, she's already shown us that just this morning." His eyes flicked down to Thie's leg, then back up to his eyes. His voice grew pleading. "If your leg is infected, it could kill you in days. And if she knew that, I know she'd help. Just tell her you need help."

"Kel, look, I don't think it's a good idea-"

"Hey." A nearby voice caught both quarians off-guard, and they turned to see Sephira gazing lazily at them, sipping her tea. "What's going on?"

Thie began to speak, remembered his external speakers, and terminated the private comm line, then cleared his throat. "Nothing. Why do you ask?"

"You two looked an awful lot like you were having a conversation over there." Sephira did not look convinced. In fact, she looked... concerned? "Or an argument. Mind filling me in?"

Kel elbowed Thie hard in the ribs. Thie winced and glared at him, and Kel stared back with eyes that said, _"If you don't tell her, I certainly will."_ They quietly glared at each other for a moment or two. Then Thie gave in.

With a heavy sigh, he turned back to Sephira, chewing on the inside of his cheek. It was a nervous habit of his he'd never quite been able to stop. "We were arguing," he admitted, averting his eyes and resolutely looking anywhere but directly at Sephira, "about whether or not I should ask you for help with something."

"With what?" She didn't sound inconvenienced, or annoyed, or even disinterested. In fact, once he dared a glance at her again, he thought she looked rather intent.

Filled with a bit more confidence, he motioned to his leg. "It's just- well, on the slaver ship," his pulse quickened a bit and he had to pause and take a breath to calm himself again, "I broke my arm in one place and my leg in two. The turians with Axilus did what they could, but the last time I had access to any sort of antibiotics was several days ago, and my leg's hurt like a bitch since." That was the truth; he'd used up his suit's stores of antibiotics on the slaver ship just trying to keep himself alive long enough to even hope for rescue, especially after his mask had been broken. He hadn't saved much for later because he hadn't thought there would _be_ a later. And his supply of painkillers, even despite his rather conservative use of them, was running low, too. "Kel's worried it might be getting infected. He wants me to see a doctor. But all I have on me is 200 credits, and that's hardly enough for a shuttle, let alone a run to the clinic and antibiotics."

Sephira looked at him intently, quietly, looking him up and down and just... watching him. Just as Thie began to beat himself up for getting his hopes up, she nodded. "I'll see what I can do. But you ought to eat first."

"I'm so sorr--" He broke off, blinking rapidly in confusion. Then he raised his head and stared at her, eyes wide as plates, and gasped, "What?"

"You heard me. This could be a matter of life and death, what the fuck kind of turian am I to just let it go because you're a quarian?" She gave them a meaningful look. "I mean, I may be a bitch, but I'm not heartless." Then she shook her head and sipped at her tea. "Aephis is almost done making breakfast. You two eat something and let me eat, then I'll take you to the clinic and get you both stocked up with plenty of antibiotics and painkillers."

"I- oh, Keelah." A thought occurred to Thie which, in retrospect, probably should have much, _much_ sooner. "How will we repay you? We don't exactly have- I- I mean, maybe we can get jobs or-"

Sephira chuckled. Then she called up her omni-tool and called, "Solas?"

Thie jumped as a glowing purple combat drone popped up next to Sephira, its holographic 'eye' flicking between her and the two quarians. Its model was strange; instead of a smooth ball, two long holographic spikes reached back from either side of its 'eye', like a turian crest. Must have been customized, he realized. "How may I be of service, Lady Sephira?"

"Relay my current bank balance, please."

"As you wish, Lady Sephira. Your current balance is 13.4 billion credits. Do you wish to make a deposit or withdrawal?"

She gave Thie an odd little look. "No, thank you. That will be all, Solas." Then she cracked a smile. "Don't worry about paying me back."

"It has been a pleasure, Lady Sephira. Logging out."

Thie stared bug-eyed at where the little drone had hovered, watching digital "snow" fall from the lingering fragments of its hologram until nothing remained. Then he looked at Sephira and tried to speak, but found he couldn't.

Luckily, Kel, as usual, could. "Is that _legal?"_

"Of course it is!" Now Sephira was the one who sounded way too damn happy. "As far as the government's concerned, it's still only a VI."

 _"Only?"_ Thie spat, eyes growing wider. "Do you mean to tell me that thing is a- Do you even-?!"

"Oh, don't start." Sephira huffed a bit, flaring her mandibles briefly. "It's not an AI. Not yet. It's still got years before its programming even _begins_ to tend towards that. It's just a very good VI."

"With all the capabilities of a combat drone still intact," Aephis muttered from further in the kitchen.

Sephira smiled that turian smile again. "He's just mad because Solas likes to wake him up with a little bit of lightning every now and then. Spice up his day."

"Yeah, right, fuckin' 'spice up', more like 'fuck up'..."

"Hush, you baby. You almost done?"

"Yeah, yeah. Get me a plate."

"Pardon me." Sephira gave the two quarians the smuggest smile they'd ever seen on a turian and pranced off.

Thie watched her go. Then he turned to blink at Kel, reactivating the private channel. "This family is fuckin' weird."

Kel nodded in agreement. "And here I thought _your_ family was nuts."

"Hey, my brother's fine, it's just my dad who's nuts. And you can blame the red sand for that. These guys have no excuse." He paused. "Unless all turian families are like this and the extranet's just been lying to us all these years. Which one do _you_ think is more probable?"

"I have no idea." Kel pushed off of the table. "Well, I'm gonna go get a couple tubes. Want one?"

"No way." Thie grimaced. "I feel nasty enough already, no need to add _that_ shit to the 'make Thie drown in his own vomit' pile, there's already enough in that."

"Like?"

"Like the way my leg is throbbing. You know how in vids, enough pain apparently makes people throw up? Well, guess what I'm experiencing just about now."

Kel made a face beneath his helmet. "Ew. I don't wanna know, I'm just gonna go."

"You should ask Shortie over there if she wants some." He nodded towards Siri, who was still awkwardly hovering around Sephira. "I don't think she's eaten, either."

"Yeah, I should... well, I should probably just get her away from Mistress Actinus before she eats her or something."

"That would also be a good idea."

"I'm gonna do that." Kel terminated his side of the channel and trotted over to Siri, gently taking her by the arm (and scaring her half to death anyway, the poor thing seemed like the most nervous little ball of anxiety he'd ever seen, and for him, that was saying something) and leading her away from the two turians bustling about.

Thie watched them leave. Then he sighed and turned back, and this time he wasn't surprised even the slightest when two krogan suddenly appeared right in front of him with shit-eating grins on their faces.

"Sorry, you're an hour late to the 'Scare the Piss Out of Thie'Haasn' event," he coolly stated, giving them a mild look. "But you got here in time to watch me drink my tea, if that's your fancy."

"Aww." Crux slumped theatrically, then popped back up and grinned. "Hey. Know if the lady's restocked the supply of ryncol? Me and Red went through the bottle she had like water."

Raik made a disapproving noise. "Most watered-down varren piss I've ever had."

"You're, what, fifteen hundred years old?" Crux blinked at him. "And _that_ was the worst?"

"Yep. Pretty damn bad. I'd say that's a new record for the worst. Ryncol. Ever." He paused for a moment, then added, "Of all time."

"To be fair, can't ryncol, y'know, kill turians?" Thie asked, raising an eyebrow. "You know, if they drink it at full strength."

"That's what makes it fun." Raik grinned. "You never know if the next shot's gonna kill someone or make 'em glow like the lights in Dark Star. Makes for very interesting parties."

Thie blinked slowly at him. "You've been to Dark Star?"

"Well, yeah. It's not on the Presidium. It's in Zakera. So I get to go whenever I want." This time, the smile looked more like bared teeth, and that was a bit spooky. "Scared the living daylights out of this human reporter there once. Didn't know I was there. Dunno how, but she didn't. Turned around and walked smack into me. And y'know, krogan are like walls. So down she goes. Dropped her datapad, her camera buzzed off two meters, and she looked at me like she'd just walked into a batarian flasher. So I just gave her this _evil-ass look_ and said, "Excuse me." And she fuckin' booked it. You shoulda seen her, I think she took flight. Broke a record. Somethin'. The turian barkeep looked like he'd just seen a fuckin' miracle. So I left about two minutes later- got damn bored with everyone leering at me- and what do you know, she fell down the stairs. I walked by her with this stupid-ass grin and she just glared at me like I just ate her cat and crapped it out on her mother's grave." He grinned. "Aired a report on krogan delinquents later that night. Best day of my life."

Thie just stared at him, while Crux just burst into laughter as was the norm for him. "Who was the reporter?" he asked, making a mental note to check for reports on krogan delinquents to see whether or not this story was one of the true ones.

Raik shrugged. "Who knows? It was years ago. Think her name mighta been... Al'Bahookie, Albuquerque, somethin'. I don't know. Didn't care enough to remember. Just knew it was damn funny. That barkeep looked at me like the next- what's the human saying, the next Jesus?- for years after that. Drinks on the house and everything." He grinned widely. "He even backstocked me with a fucktillion bottles of the good ryncol. And some quarian alcohol. 500% alcohol or some shit. Damn good buzz."

"I've never heard of that kind of alcohol before."

"That's cuz it was only ever made on Rannoch. Hits like a train full of CAINs. The missile ones. Mini-nukes."

"I know what it is."

"We ever go by the Citadel, I'm takin' you there. And don't give me no shit about quarians in lounges, that bird'll let you in and give you whatever you want, on the house." He gave a clumsy little bow. "Thanks to me. You may applaud at your discretion."

"I'm back with- oh, hi, guys!" Kel stood awkwardly at the border of the kitchen and den, Siri following shortly (heh, short) behind. In his hands were two tubes of nutrient paste, one of which he offered to Thie with another obvious behind-the-mask smile. "Here, Thie. I brought you one in case you wanted it."

"And I told you I don't."

"Oh, well. More for me?" He didn't sound enthusiastic, and Thie couldn't blame him. The stuff tasted like... well, nothing. Exactly nothing. All the flavor had been centrifuged out along with all the fat and unnecessary calories in the liveships. There was a reason each pilgrim was given a backpack full of tubes of the stuff, and even though Thie knew it was to keep a month's worth of rations in one small space, he couldn't help but feel like it was also just the fleet desperately shoving it off on whoever didn't need actual food so _they_ didn't have to eat it. There was only so much of the decent stuff available, but most pilgrims didn't know that. Or need to. At least in the eyes of the captains.

Sephira glanced back and gave Thie a sharp look. "You'd better eat something, kid. Or I'll come back there and shove it down your throat myself. Through the tube. Whatever. I don't care. Eat." Then she sighed. "And I'm sorry, you two, but we don't have any levo rations here, so you'll have to do without until we can get to the store."

"Is there ryncol?"

Both turians spoke at the same time, Sephira sounding amused and Aephis cross. "Sorry, no." "So _you're_ the sorry bastards who took it all!"

"Gurdnau Crux, at your service, good sir," Crux eagerly introduced himself, dipping into the same awkward half-bow Raik had just moment ago. "You got a nice place here."

Beside him, Raik shrugged and grunted, "Raik Gemeng."

Aephis stared. "... okay, I don't know whether Blue there is making fun of me or not, but don't. Major Aephis Madelivio. You may call me 'sir'."

"Righto, Major Tailfeathers."

Aephis bristled. "What was that-?"

"It's his thing," Raik quickly jumped in. "Nicknames, I mean. He does it to everyone. Calls the cripple 'Tiny' and the turian 'Mads'. Tried to call me 'Shitstain' until I agreed to 'Red'." Then he elbowed Crux hard and growled, "Get us kicked out and I'll kick your ass off the balcony again." Crux just grinned.

"Ugh." Aephis fluttered his mandibles hard enough to clack them against the hard plates of his jaw and turned back to the food he was cooking. Thie was suddenly very glad he'd turned off his olfactory filters; from the look of things, whatever he was making was going to be damn good. No need to associate nausea with good turian cuisine.

But Sephira was still glaring at him, so he sighed and accepted the still-outstretched tube of paste from Kel, who gave him a thankful shrug and retreated to the den with his own. Siri, still silent as the grave either out of fear or shyness, trailed after him.

Thie glanced back at Sephira, giving her a shrug. "I apologize if I have to take over your bathroom in a few minutes to throw up. I've been feeling nauseous for the past hour or so. Very sorry."

"Don't you try to guilt-trip me, young man. You forget, I have two boys of my own."

"Sorry." Thie ducked his head and turned, fully intending to walk out of the room and fully expecting to accomplish that very simple goal without yet another interruption.

And again, the galaxy proved that it really fucking hated him.

A shimmer of broken light rolled in from the den and stopped cold right in front of Thie, nearly tripping him. Then the tactical cloak broke and a vaguely-familiar turian scurried across the floor like an overgrown cockroach, screeching, to cling to Aephis's leg.

"DAD! THERE'S A _KROGAN IN THE KITCHEN!"_ Tollak screeched, eyes wider than Thie'd thought a turian's eyes could ever get. They almost filled up the space between the plates above and below his eyes.

Aephis sighed. "Good morning, Tollak."

Seconds later, he screamed-- legitimately _screamed,_ so loud that Thie's audio input speakers squealed with feedback hard enough to cause static to erupt rather painfully in his ears-- and switched to clinging to his mother's legs, instead. "MOM! THERE'S _TWO_ KROGAN IN THE KITCHEN!"

"We're aware of that, Tollak." Sephira sounded pitiful, reaching up to rub rather hard at her eyes. "Believe me, we-"

And then Crux made it worse by striking a pose and belting out an ancient human song for no discernable reason whatsoever, sounding far too jolly to be real. "Hello, my baby, hello, my honey, hello, my ragtime--"

His voice was drowned out by the excruciatingly painful sound of a turian screaming at the top of his lungs, hard enough that his mandibles rattled against the plating behind his jaw and against his teeth. His subvocals reached a terrible pitch that Thie's input speakers entirely gave up on transmitting _everything,_ though that didn't stop him from still hearing it through his suit just as clearly. His head and ears were ringing like _fuck._ "MOM! _IT'S SINGING!"_ Tollak positively _screamed._ _"THERE IS A SINGING KROGAN IN THE KITCHEN!"_

Sephira grimaced and quickly reached down to stroke behind Tollak's mandibles. "Honey, shh, shh! Calm down! He's friendly! Though I don't know why the _fuck_ he's _singing!"_ Crux obediently stopped, and she knelt down next to Tollak, who was still screaming at the top of his lungs. "Shh, shh, relax! Tollak, _please!"_ Then, when he still didn't shut up, she sighed, drew a hand back, and slapped him _hard._

He shut up immediately, mandibles quivering. Then he asked, in the most pitiful voice Thie had ever heard, "Mom? Am I going insane?"

Sephira sighed. "No, your brother just has terrible taste in friends."

He was quiet for a moment. "... can I throw Ax off the balcony?"

"No, Tollak."

"But, Mom-!"

 _"No,_ Tollak." She sat back on her heels, resting her weight on the spurs branching off of the backs of her calves. "Speaking of Axilus, though..." Thie's speakers popped and started transmitting again just in time for Sephira to give a sharp whistle that nearly scared Thie out of his suit. Her odd little combat drone appeared at her side again with a cheerful greeting, and she just nodded and said, "Solas, go find Axilus, would you?"

"Of course, Lady Sephira." The drone buzzed off. From the den, Thie heard a pleasant, "Lady Sephira requests your presence immediately," followed after a moment by a loud squawk.

Then Axilus came tearing into the kitchen with a pitiful look on his face. "Mom, your drone shocked me!

"I know." She fixed him with a hard glare that froze him in his tracks. "Axilus. What, exactly, were you doing?"

Axilus whimpered. "I, um, well, you see..." He nervously glanced at Aephis, who, while he hadn't stopped cooking, certainly wasn't ignoring the conversation, then blurted, "We wanted food, but we didn't wanna get yelled at!"

Sephira stared at him. Axilus stared back. Tollak, still clinging to her leg, just whimpered.

Then Sephira sighed. "Hey, you. Krogan. Take the quarians outside for a few, all three of them. I need to have a word with my boys."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All right! So now that I've got an outline to follow for the remainder of the fic, I've been able to create a chapter buffer! This means that I'm going to start updating regularly instead of however long it takes for me to write up a chapter from scratch! So all of you who have been with me since the beginning, experiencing the long almost-hiatus periods between chapters, rejoice! I'll now be updating every Friday. :D
> 
> Special thanks to user NoisyNoiverns, who provided a good amount of lore and dialogue for this chapter and the next and also gave me someone to bounce ideas off of in order to write more effectively. It's because of you that I'm able to write well.


	11. Heatstroke, Doctor Visits, and Unwanted Cultural Lectures: The Best Way To Start the Day

The first thing Thie noticed when he reentered the apartment was just how nice the air conditioning really was.

He closed his eyes and just basked in the cool for a moment, sighing softly. Quarians didn’t sweat too terribly much, which was damn good for when you were stuck on a ship in the middle of space just in case the air happened to go out for one reason or another and restoring it took long enough that the whole place was a damn sweltering hive in days, but it was still enough that his envirosuit felt like it was sticking to his skin, and in all the wrong places, too. Didn’t help that he’d forgotten that he still had open wounds swathed in bandages on his leg and arm, and also that open wounds and sweat generally didn’t go together. So now everything ached like a bitch, his suit was sticking to him in a very bad way, and it was becoming more and more evident that the galaxy hated him with every passing moment. So he was happy to take refuge where and when he could.

He didn’t get to enjoy it for too long, however, as seconds after his mind registered the cool slowly soaking through the fabric of his suit, he became aware of eyes on him. He opened his eyes and blinked at the scene before him.

Sephira sat on the couch, Tollak awkwardly curled up with his head in her lap. Her hand rested on the back of his neck, just below his fringe, and she had a very strange yet very distinct frown twitching at her mandibles. “Tollak,” she said, “you’re sick.”

Tollak moaned something incoherent and buried his face in Sephira’s leg. “No, I’m not.”

“You have a fever. How long have you been sick? Why haven’t you said anything?”

“I’m not sick.”

“You’re sick. Convenient that we’re going to the clinic anyway, isn’t it?” She sighed and swatted just above his mandibles, eliciting a sharp, high-pitched whine from him. “Come on, get up. You need to go get ready to leave.”

Tollak jumped, sat up quickly, and pulled his mandibles in tight against his face with a sharp  _snap,_ shaking his head. “I’m not going to the doctor!”

“Yes, you are.” Sephira gave him a glare so sharp, Thie couldn’t help but wince. “Go get dressed. We’re leaving in fifteen, and if you’re not ready, I’ll drag you out stark naked, because you’re going whether you want to or not.”

Tollak made a vaguely disapproving (or was it distressed?) noise somewhere in the back of his throat, drawing up his nasal plates in a grimace. Then he huffed and struggled to his feet, mumbling, “Yes, Mom,” before trudging off ever-so-slowly down the hall.

Sephira twisted to glance back at Thie once he’d left. “Apparently my son is coming with us because he’s a fucking moron too. Shame, I thought Ax was the one missing the brains, not both of them. Got to wonder where they shoved them if they’re both idiots, I know I passed down some brains  _somewhere._ Probably shoved them up their asses with all the other good things I tried to pass along...” Then she sighed and stood. “Take a minute to cool off. I’ve got to go get my headscarf.”

Kel blinked. “Uh, headscarf?”

“I’ll explain later.” She waved a hand and just walked away. Halfway down the hallway, they heard a loud yawn, then a loud  _thud_  and a “Dammit, Tollak!”, and then the content  _swoosh_  of a door opening and closing.

Thie blinked at Kel. Kel shrugged helplessly. “I have no idea,” he said. “Turians are weird.”

“No kidding.” Thie shook his head at the empty hallway and began limping his way around the couch, wincing with every step. Getting sweat in the open wounds was a very bad idea; where his leg had just been content before to feel like it was breaking all over again, now it had gotten the idea of feeling instead like someone with a very bad sense of humor had filled his veins with some very horrible sort of acid as a joke. Everything fucking _hurt,_ and it was even worse than before, which was a serious achievement. “I’m going to sit down before my leg does it for me.”

He plopped down on the stiff cushions with a groan, leaning back and closing his eyes. Now if they could just drop the temperature ten, twenty degrees, maybe get some of that ‘snow’ stuff he’d heard so much about falling…

And then one of the krogan decided to sit down next to him and he spent the next several minutes flailing helplessly as the couch decided to dump him in Raik’s lap.

Raik didn’t help at all, just chuckled at him as he flailed and managed to push himself back to where he’d been sitting before. Then he just raised an eye ridge at him. “Lookin’ good, Twinkle Toes. Might wanna be nicer to your leg, though.”

“Shut up, that was your fault.”

“That’s what they always say.”

He grumbled and leaned back again, closing his eyes while doing his very best to ignore the krogan camping at one side and the two quarians awkwardly sneaking onto the couch from the other. “Just let me have some peace…”

“Sorry, kid, but I don’t think such a thing exists in this household.” Thie jumped out of his skin for the ninetieth time and turned to glower at the turian who had reappeared in the hallway for about half a second. Then he just stared. “Yeah, yeah, I know. Never seen a turian in a headscarf, I get that a lot.” Sephira rolled her eyes, apparently having trouble tucking part of the fabric down or… something like that, Thie wasn’t quite sure how that mess worked. “Aephis, come help me with this, I think it’s caught.”

“Oh yes, it’s definitely caught.” Aephis slunk over and touched his forehead to Sephira’s. “My attention, that is. You look good. But I think you’re right. Turn around.”

Thie watched quietly as the two tangoed with the fabric, untangling it from her cowl and winding it into something which almost resembled the hoods he’d seen on most turian females, though much more sheer and oddly more… feminine. He, personally, was too shy to say anything about it, no matter how much he wondered, but luckily, Kel didn’t share the same problem.

“Why are you wearing that?” he piped up, head cocked in that manner that always managed to keep him out of trouble despite whatever troublesome thing he said. “The scarf. It’s really pretty.”

“Because albinism is a bitch,” Sephira and Aephis both replied. They exchanged an amused look, then Sephira added, “And thank you.”

“You’re an albino?” This time, Thie managed to coax his voice into working, and he regretted it immediately when Sephira gave him an acidic look in response.

Aephis put a hand on her shoulder, and she sighed. “Yes. Sorry. Most turians recognize albinos on sight. Forgot you don’t really know what we look like.” She took a moment to adjust one of the folds on the scarf, then shrugged. “We’re very rare. Thulium can only do so much, so most turians have a metric fuckton of different pigments in their plates to protect them from the sun, and about half that many in the skin, which is why you see such wide variation in our colors. I have exactly zero, so I have to cover up as much skin as physically possible to protect myself. Thus the scarf.”

Kel cocked his head in the other direction. “But you’re not,” he pointed out. “Only your head’s covered.”

“There’s no skin exposed on my arms,” she replied, twisting her arms and holding them out to demonstrate. “I can just put a balm on the plates, and I’m fine. So I can wear all the sleeveless shirts I damn well want to in the summer. Which is good, because it gets hotter than a krogan’s quad outside on this stupid planet.”

Ignoring the two snickering krogan, Aephis bobbed his head in some weird gesture Thie assumed was a nod of agreement. “Speaking of which, did you-?” He leaned in and sniffed at Sephira’s plates, then recoiled like the scarf had bitten him. “Yeah, yeah you did.”

Sephira chuckled at the disgusted expression on his face, then glanced back at the quarians. “I have to cake the shit on. Helpful, but smells  _terrible._ Kids used to hate going outside with me when they were little, because they had to stay close enough to smell me the whole time.”

From somewhere in the kitchen, Axilus groaned and called, “Thanks for the warning, Dad!”

Sephira’s mandibles twitched in what Thie was pretty sure was amusement, but could just as easily have been annoyance. “Just eat, Ax, you still have to do the dishes!” Her mandibles fluttering a little harder as Axilus whined, she folded her arms across her chest. “Any other questions, while we’re on the subject? It’s not exactly something I like talking about in public.”

“But... we’re not  _in_  public.” Sometimes Thie honestly wondered why Kel didn’t get strangled more often.

Sephira seemed to get the same idea, because she looked at Kel with an expression he could only describe as the phrase “no shit” made flesh. Then she turned to Aephis and asked, “You see what I put up with?”

Aephis nodded patiently. “Yes, dear. You’re a shining pillar of patience and goodwill. Truly, you are a role model for us all.”

“Whoever taught you sarcasm should be shot.”

“The spirits frown on self-inflicted violence, you know.”

“Ha. Ha. Ha. You are so funny. Go kiss a  _kori.”_

Thie, having been about to ask why she was telling Aephis to kiss a quarian, instead made a mental note to ask what the hell a  _kori_  was. Kel, meanwhile, apparently striving to break his record for most poorly-thought-out questions at the worst possible time ever in an hour, said, “But that doesn’t sound  _so_  bad. Why do you hate being an albino so much if all you have to do is cover up in the sun?”

“Oh, now you’ve done it,” Aephis muttered. “Let me know when you’re done, dear, I’m getting clear of the blast zone.”

“Oh, no you don’t,” Sephira warned, grabbing his upper arm with a dangerous look on her face. “Stay here, I’ll need someone to do damage control.”

“Oh,  _lovely,”_ Aephis grumbled. “Ax, your mom’s about to go off on this sucker! Tell my mother I love her! And tell my cousin I take back exactly  _none_  of those times I shoved him in a locker!”

“Which cousin?” Axilus called from the kitchen.

“Trust me, if you ever run into him, you’ll know!”

Thie glanced over at Kel, whose eyes had gone wide as plates behind his mask, and nodded respectfully. “Well, it was nice knowing you, Kel. I’ll send regards to your parents.”

“That’s not funny!” Kel hissed, sounding panicked. “What do I  _do?!_ I didn’t think this through-!”

“Obviously not. You fucked up big-time, kid,” came Raik’s reply. He stood up. “I’m gonna get clear before Hurricane Actinus hits ground. See what’s left of you on the other side.”

Kel whimpered and shrunk back into the couch as if he hoped it would swallow him whole. “I’m only seventeen, I don’t wanna die…!”

“Too bad. Think before you speak next time.” Thie cracked a small smirk. “If there  _is_  a next time.” Personally, he would have loved nothing more than to escape the storm as well, but, well, with a broken leg, that was somewhat impossible, at least without causing himself a load of unnecessary pain. So he just shrunk down as far as he could, hopefully out of the range of the Actinus Acid Glare, and observed.

Meanwhile, Sephira had been puffing up like an indignant hanar, by now shaking with rage. Apparently, her fury was the polite kind, because when she finally spoke, her tone was more neutral than he would have thought possible for a turian currently standing almost entirely on her toe-claws, her shoulders pulled up nearly to the top of her mandibles. “Turian albinos,” she said stonily, “are rare to the point where I have only known of two others in all fifty-six years of my life, and they were  _brothers.”_ She spat the word like a curse. “This means that any given albino is a fucking  _profit opportunity_  to the  _vast fucking majority_  of society.” Her mandibles flared wide, showing off all her teeth. “When I was  _thirteen fucking years old_ , I tried to research my condition. Half the results were  _porn.”_

Kel made a motion like he wanted to say something. Thie very quickly activated his omni-tool and waved it in his direction, offlining his external audio channel with a short burst of static. Then he sat back, much more at ease now that Kel wouldn't be making it worse with ill-timed comments, and turned back to the scene.

Sephira let go of Aephis’ arm and started pacing, toe-claws hitting the floor with a series of ominous clacks. Beside Thie, Kel seemed to sink into his suit, if that was even possible with how form-fitting they were. Behind his mask, his eyes had gone past “dinner plate,” skipped “moon” entirely, and were fast approaching “mass relay core.” A glint of light caught Thie’s eye, and he watched as it headed into the kitchen. Moments later, a bronze head joined Axilus’s red-brown one peering around the corner to watch the impending apocalypse.

By now, Sephira had seemingly hit her stride, and was stamping her feet with every furious step. “Because  _apparently,”_ she fumed, “being  _rare_  means everyone is  _entitled_  to me, and it’s  _totally okay_  for them to treat me like a fucking _sex object_  that will just  _lie down_  and  _spread her fucking legs_  because she’s such a  _freak of fucking nature_  that she’s fucking  _lucky_  that anybody would want to  _look_  at her, much less  _fuck_  her, and- and-!” She let out a frustrated roar, gesturing wildly with splayed talons and eyes squeezed shut.

Then she just kind of... stopped.

She stopped moving, her arms fell to her sides, and she just sort of slumped in the most defeated posture Thie had ever seen on a turian. Aephis slowly approached her, gently pulling her close to him and pressing his forehead to hers with a very quiet, “Shh, shh, it’s alright. He didn’t mean anything by it, he didn’t know. It’s okay. I’ve got you. You’re okay.”

Sephira slumped against him, moving her head to rest against Aephis’ neck with a quiet, keening little whine. Thie was about to try to change the subject when Kel, in the biggest show of awful timing yet, said, “Well, I can see why everyone would try to flirt with you.”

Thie swore the temperature in the room dropped about a gazillion percent as everyone present froze, and silently cursed that he hadn't just killed Kel's audio output entirely. They could have repaired it later and been spared the rest of the storm if he'd done something a little less temporary. Sephira’s expression, as far as Thie could tell, went from “too upset to think” to “they will never find your body” in an instant, mandibles dropping to show her teeth and a low growl rumbling through the room.

Without missing a beat, Kel finished, “Because you’re really pretty. I’m not even a turian and I can tell,” and gave the biggest, brightest smile Thie couldn’t see.

Sephira blinked, mandibles turning in small circles as she processed this new information, then stood up, brushed herself off, adjusted her headscarf, and smiled that weird turian grin. “I changed my mind, Aephis. This one won’t need a hearse.”

Thie's eyebrows shot up and his mouth dropped. Literally twenty seconds ago he'd been trying to think of how in the world he was going to tell Kel's parents that their son had foolishly talked himself into execution. Now it was like nothing had even happened.

He made a mental note to never piss off turian women again. This sudden change of mood was fucking _terrifying._

Aephis raised one of his brow plates. “Damn,” he said dryly. “One more murder, and the funeral would’ve been free.”

Sephira shoved him lightly, chuckling. “I’ll be fine, dear. Go make sure your sons aren’t up to anything in the kitchen, you know how fast desserts disappear when they’re both in there at the same time.” From the other room, one of the brothers cursed, and Sephira called, “Yes, Tollak, I know you’re there, just because I was busy doesn’t mean I didn’t see you, and you _still_ have to go to the doctor!”

The cursing lasted much longer this time.

"Just come on, Tollak." She paused, then flicked out a mandible and casually added, "There are no krogan at the clinic."

Tollak was at her side in an instant, and recoiled from her instantaneously. "When do we- oh, _spirits,_ Mom!" He clamped a hand over his nose and whined, "You could've _warned_ me!"

"You didn't hear your father bitching about it?"

"No, I was getting _dressed_ like I was _told_ to!" Tollak sniffed and folded his arms. "Because I'm a _good_ turian who _listens."_

Sephira rolled her eyes. "Obviously not, or you would have known I had put on the balm. Like _you_ ought to."

"Nope, no thanks. I'm only going to the clinic so I don't have to be around krogan, putting on _that_ shit is _too far."_

"You bitch too much."

"Look at who my father is and try to tell me you're seriously surprised."

"Hey!" came Aephis's indignant squawk from the kitchen.

Sephira rolled her eyes harder and called back, "You know he's right!"

"Yes, but still!"

"Whatever. Tollak, you ready?" She glanced at her older son, who nodded with a loud, dramatic sigh. "Good. Other kids, come on. That means you, Shortie McCripple."

Thie frowned and Sephira cracked a smile, then glanced back to the kitchen. "Aephis, make sure Axilus does the dishes, it's been his turn for a month, and he can make up for being back so damn early by catching up."

"But Moooom!"

She turned on her heel and strode for the door, Tollak trotting at her side. "Come on, the sooner we get this done and over with, the better."

Siri trailed after her, and Kel stood up, then hesitated and stared awkwardly at Thie, who was having a hell of a time trying to get up. "Uh... do you want some help?"

Thie gave him a cold glare and hissed through gritted teeth, "That'd be _nice."_

A moment or two of struggle and no small amount of pain later, Thie hobbled out the front door and up to Sephira's side, ignoring both her amused stare and the wall of sweltering mugginess that slammed into him with the force of a krogan. "Not looking forward to the stairs..."

"Axilus _did_ tell you there's no elevator, right?" He would have punched Sephira for her mocking tone if he'd felt a little more suicidal, but luckily he was just a bit smarter than Kel was. "And I sure as hell ain't carrying you."

"Oh, believe me, I know." Thie grumbled a little, carefully making his way over to the stairs and grasping the railing like it was the only thing between him and death. Which it sort of was, because holy _shit_ was that a long fall. "The one time I wish I had crutches..."

Halfway down the flight of stairs, which took far longer than it should have since they had for some reason decided to let the crippled one lead the entourage, Sephira piped up with an amused, "I could push you the rest of the way. Like a volus," and added, after a moment and with a chuckle, "I might be the reason there aren't that many of them left in this building."

Thie flinched. Poor volus. "You are a cruel person."

Her reply was far too bright for what they were discussing. "I know."

Tollak, from somewhere behind Thie, groaned, said, "Oh, fuck this," and, before Thie was quite aware of what was happening, mounted the railing and went sailing by.

Sephira called, "You're going to ruin your plates!"

And a reply echoed back after a minute. "Fuck my plates, this is fun!"

Thie grumbled, very quickly letting go of the railing when Kel decided to do the same thing. "You're going to get yourself killed!"

"Nah, I'm not as unlucky as you are!"

Thie scowled and clenched his fists, then reminded himself to relax when his implant heated up, scalding the back of his neck like a hot coal. Right. He'd forgotten biotics responded particularly well to strong emotion. Heaving a sigh, he watched the blue fade from his hands, then paused and glanced back to see Sephira staring at him with wide eyes. "Oh, son of a..."

She held up a hand. "I'm not going to ask." He was just about to thank her. Then she hopped up on the railing and, as Thie watched with a mixture of confusion, shock, and irritation, hopped off and elegantly parkoured her way from their building to the next on down to the ground.

Then he looked up at Siri, who gave him a helpless shrug and came forward, looping an arm under his. "I'll help you downstairs?"

He just sighed. "Works for me."

It took them about seven minutes to make their way downstairs, and by the time they made it to the bottom of the final flight, Thie's body was coated with sweat, his suit clinging to him like a wet coat that did nothing but make the heat worse. He was beginning to feel light-headed from the mixture of heat exhaustion and pain positively radiating from his leg, and found himself leaning on Siri far too much for her tiny frame to support to take the weight off of his injury.

Sephira tutted and rushed over, sweeping Thie up into her arms like he didn't weigh a thing. "I knew you wouldn't last long out of the air conditioning. Be glad the clinic isn't too far away, or you'd be out of luck."

Thie managed a quiet groan in response, dropping his head against her shoulder. His panting had fogged over his visor, and he could hear his suit struggling to activate his helmet's defog function, though there wasn't much change so he assumed it wasn't working quite right. Nothing was. He couldn't even open a private chat channel to Siri to tell her thank you; apparently the humidity had shorted out something, or maybe his sweating had. Or maybe his head was just too fuzzy to properly operate his suit anymore. If that was it, _Keelah_ was that sad.

He lost track of the time it took to traverse Cipritine, just knew that his helmet was heating up further with each passing second, until what few metal bits there were touching his skin had begun to scald. He couldn't be assed to do anything about it, though, not with how sick he was feeling, so he just lay there and let it burn.

And then he heard the gentle tinkling of a bell and a sudden arctic blast rushed over him, scaring the living daylights out of him.

Luckily, the cool chased away the fog in an instant, and he blinked and glanced around the small clinic they'd entered, thoroughly surprised. It was very small and looked an awful lot like the medbays back on the Migrant Fleet, just a little... less clumsy. More organized. Professional. Whatever words fit.

He glanced up at Sephira, who looked down at him and spread her mandibles in a smile. "That sure woke you up. You and Tol can sit down while I get signed in."

"I, uh..." He struggled for words as she gently placed him back on his feet, automatically wincing when weight was put on his bad leg. "Thank you. For the help. And taking me to the doctor. And everything..."

"Yeah, yeah." She patted the top of his head almost affectionately, then lightly smacked his shoulder and pointed to a small, mostly-empty waiting room lined with chairs. "Go sit down. Make sure Tollak isn't up and pacing, he needs his rest."

"I- Yes, ma'am." He resisted the urge to salute and turned, hobbling towards the waiting room after Tollak and the other two quarians.

The two or three turians already waiting gave Thie the dirty looks he expected and thankfully moved away, leaving a rather large space between them and the chair he collapsed in. Unexpectedly, though, they didn't immediately begin to gossip, though he could feel curious eyes on his injured leg. Siri and Kel sat on either side of him, and Tollak dragged together five or six chairs, then flopped down and closed his eyes.

Sephira joined them moments later, perching primly on the chair across from Thie. "It'll be a ten minute wait or so, they said," she cheerfully stated after giving the other turians present a dark glare, daring them to say anything about either her or the quarians in her care. "Stretch out, relax. Enjoy the cool air."

Thie shifted in his seat, stretching out his bad leg and wincing a bit. As much as he wanted to do as she said, he doubted she'd be happy if he removed his mask, even if she knew how stiflingly hot it was inside his suit. "Thank you for carrying me here," he said quietly, ducking his head.

"Just don't expect me to do it again." She gave him one of those Looks he'd gotten used to seeing from Lieutenant Nieght, then shrugged. "It wasn't that big a deal. You're about as heavy as Tol was ten years ago. Which means you should probably put on a little weight, because that's a little sad. How old are you, fourteen?"

Thie felt his cheeks flush and hoped she couldn't see the faint glow. "Twenty, actually."

"Oh." She looked surprised for a moment, then shrugged. "Even more reason to build some muscle."

"Maybe." He glanced away, then noticed Siri staring and gave her a rather cross look. "What?"

"You're twenty?" she asked, her voice scarcely more than a whisper. She sounded dumbfounded. "And you're still on your Pilgrimage?"

"He got a late start," Kel chirped from Thie's other side. "I did, too. I'm seventeen. How old are you?"

Siri stared at them both, then ducked her head and shyly answered, "Fifteen. And I started last year..."

Thie blinked at her. Then he groaned and sat back. "Great. Now I feel like a _real_ loser."

"What, because you're older than her?" Sephira sounded mildly confused. "I don't get it, we ship our kids off to boot camp when they're fifteen, too. Then they're in boot camp as long as it takes for them to grow up and learn to be real soldiers. Sounds like the quarians do the same, so what am I missing?"

"Quarians leave for Pilgrimage whenever their captain thinks them mature enough to handle being on their own," Thie slowly replied, closing his eyes and shaking his head. "Most of us leave around sixteen or seventeen, like Kel. I got held back because of my..." His hand lit up with a blue aura for a moment, and he shook his head. "Abilities. So the fact that Siri here got released when she was fourteen is saying she's more capable of taking care of herself at fourteen than I am at twenty, and that's a _serious_ insult for _anyone."_

Sephira cracked a Cheshire grin. "So you're grumpy because your manhood is at stake, is that what I'm hearing?"

"What?" Thie jumped and stared at her. "No, it's-!"

"That's what it sounds like!" Her voice took on a playful tone, her subvocals buzzing painfully just at the edge of hearing. "I live with three men and have the most overprotective bastard in the galaxy for a father, I think I know what I'm about, son." She flicked out a mandible. "You're _jealous."_

Thie sputtered. Kel burst into laughter. Siri shrunk into her suit.

He was just about to retort when a bronze turian poked her head into the waiting room and said, "Mistress Actinus, the doctor will see you now."

Sephira stood up and clapped her hands together. "All right, Tollak, up you go!" She ignored the resulting whine from the mass of turian curled up on two of the five chairs he'd pulled together and moved to help Thie up. "Come on, the sooner we get done with this, the sooner we know whether or not I have to pay for surgery, too." She raised her voice. "And whether or not Tol has to get a shot."

Tollak whined and tightly curled up. "Now I'm _definitely_ not going!"

"Too late, son. You're already here. Don't make me carry you in there like a nestling."

"Nooooo..."

"Tollak."

"Nooooo!"

Her voice took on a razor edge. _"Tollak."_

With a reluctant groan, Tollak unfolded himself from the impossible ball he'd made of his body and stood up, instantly slouching over and flaring his mandibles in irritation. "You suck."

"Only if it's your father." Sephira turned on her heel, ignoring the disgruntled noise from her son. "Siri, other kid, you stay here. We'll be right back."

"I have a name!"

"Yeah, and it's 'other kid' or 'hey you'. Come on." Thie had to pick up an odd little hopping gait to keep up with the two ludicrously tall turians practically running on before him, doing his best to ignore the pain in his leg and the growing nausea in his gut. Luckily, it wasn't that long a walk.

The doctor raised his brow plates when the trio walked into the exam room, gaze lingering on Thie for just a moment before he looked to Sephira and happily asked, "What do you need, Miss?"

Sephira flared her mandibles. "First of all, it's Mistress. I'm married, you fuckass, give me some goddamn respect. Second, I need you to take a look at my son."

"Your son." The doctor flicked a mandible in Thie's direction, sounding puzzled. "The... quarian?"

"No, the- Oh, for Trebia's sake. Tollak!" She sounded more annoyed than angry. "Drop the cloak."

"I don't want a shot!" came a whine from nowhere. Thie caught a faint glimmer near the door.

Apparently Sephira saw it as well, because her hand shot out and grabbed a handful of nothing, successfully startling a yelp out of Tollak before the cloak broke. Then she pushed him towards the doctor. _"This_ idiot. He's been sleeping a whole hell of a lot these past few days, and last I checked, he had a fever. Been coughing a bit too, but not too much. What do you think?"

The doctor gave him a quick glance-over, then nodded to Sephira. "Looks like _caculor,_ a common cold. Seems to be right in the beginning stages, too. Good catch, Mistress. A shot and he'll be good as new in an hour."

"Oh, _fuck_ no." The tactical cloak went up again, and Sephira rolled her eyes. "I'm not getting a shot!"

"Yes, you are, Tollak. Stop being such a fuckin' wimp about it."

"No, I'm not!"

"Tollak." Sephira's mandibles flared out. "If you don't get this fuckin' shot, I'm going to lock the krogan in your room. And give them all the ryncol they want right before I do, and then lock you in with them." She paused for dramatic effect. "Make your choice."

A minute ticked by. Then the cloak dropped and Tollak grumpily held out an arm. "Go ahead."

"Oh no, this one is best injected in the neck for optimal performance." The doctor went after Tollak with the needle and Tollak went with it as if he were a similarly-polarized magnet. Sephira made a vaguely threatening sound, subvocals buzzing at the edge of Thie's hearing again, and Tollak reluctantly held still after giving a distressed subvocal trill, squawking when the doctor plunged the needle into the soft flesh of his neck. As soon as the shot was finished, he scrambled away, throwing up the cloak again to sulk in solitude.

The doctor then turned to Sephira. "Will that be all, Mistress?"

Sephira gave the doctor an "are you fucking kidding me" frown and jerked a thumb towards Thie, who had drifted over to awkwardly hide in the corner of the room. "He's having a problem with his leg."

"I can see that." The doctor sounded particularly haughty as he glanced over at Thie and flicked out a mandible. "However, it would appear he's already been tended to, so if you don't mind-"

 _"No."_ In the blink of an eye, Sephira was in the doctor's face, jabbing a talon into his keelbone. The doctor winced. "He could have an infection, and you know as well as I do that an infection could damn well _kill_ him. You're a doctor. He needs help. _Do your fucking job."_

The doctor's mandibles pulled in tight to his cheeks. "... I see. Well, I suppose we could remove the medical boot and try to do a scan through the suit..." When Sephira didn't budge, he heaved a sigh and added, "Or we could sterilize a clean room, take him out of his suit, and find out for sure. Right away, ma'am." He gave her an odd look. "You do realize, however, that this will cost extra, yes?"

"I'm aware." Thie flinched at the cold bite in Sephira's voice. "Do it. Now."

"Right away."

* * *

It took six minutes for the doctor to sterilize the makeshift clean room, something which would have unnerved Thie had he been back on the flotilla because it meant it wasn't necessarily clean, but he decided not to raise a fuss. Then the doctor escorted him in after sterilizing his suit, and Sephira entered an adjoining room to keep an eye on the doctor as he went about the examination.

Removing the suit took longer than Thie would have liked, and was much more painful than he remembered it being last time. His helmet and mask were simple; they disconnected and came off easily, the rush of unfiltered air and the sudden absence of neural interfaces sending chills through Thie's body. Then came the cloth sashes, worn and already so dirty that they looked more gray than blue. Then the medical boot. Then the belt, the boots, and the rest of the armored exo-suit.

He felt naked, standing in front of not one, but two turians in little more than his form-fitting endo-suit, all the tubes and wires which carried all of his suit's most critical systems left vulnerable and his head bare, face unprotected. But he tried not to show it.

The doctor glanced him over once or twice, gaze lingering on his bad leg which, even through the suit, was bulky with bandages and splints, and his arm, carefully held close to his chest. "Now for the rest of it."

Now that he knew people were looking at him, it became so much harder to ignore their stares as the suit peeled off, revealing the fine, gently glowing lines drawn by his implants pulsing softly just below his skin which traced up and down his arms and flowed across his chest and down his legs, the angry red welts crawling out from beneath mounds of gauze and medical tape which had just begun to settle into scars.

The doctor directed him to lie down on the table provided, and he did, gingerly resting his injured arm on his chest and relying on the doctor to carefully raise his leg to the table. "Hold still." And then the bandages began to come off.

He heard Sephira's soft gasp before the doctor's low tutting as the dirty, bloodied bandages fell away, and raised his head to get a better look at the damage. His leg was straight, properly set, but arcing up his leg were three parallel gashes, their edges puckered and the skin around glowing an angry red. Two misshapen circles on his shin marked where the bones had broken the skin and been forced back through.

The doctor frowned. "Looks like it's just begun to get infected. Lucky you came by when you did." Whatever traces of racist reluctance Thie had heard before were long gone now as he bustled back and forth from table to table. "I've got just the shot for it, and we'll need to clean that wound, stitch it back together, and bandage it up right. Where were you cared for?"

"I, uh- the _Anchrivos,_ sir. The training ship that rescued me." Thie hesitated, then added, hoping the doctor could hear the venom in his voice, "The doctor there didn't want to help me much, either."

"I can tell. They set your leg well enough from what I can see, but didn't take the time to stitch up the lacerations as they should have, or even clean them properly." The doctor came back with a syringe. "Let me see your arm. I'd say whatever antibiotics they gave you held it off while they were in effect, but they wore off no more than a week ago and left it festering since. There you are, some antibiotics to tide you over." He swiped a bit of gauze over the injection site, looking satisfied when it didn't bleed, then left again and returned with a number of bottles Thie couldn't read the names of now that he didn't have his omni-tool on him to translate. "Would you prefer a dose of _aegsens_ before I begin? It's the only painkiller I've got that will work with non-turian physiology, and I won't lie, this is going to _hurt."_

Thie blinked, throwing Sephira a panicked look. She nodded, though her mandibles flared a little in irritation. Then he looked back to the doctor and mutely nodded when he found he couldn't convince his voice to work.

The doctor nodded. "Right then. Hold on, I'll need to put together an appropriate dosage."

As soon as he left the room, Thie glanced over at Sephira in a panic. He still couldn't find his voice, but she seemed to know before he did and sighed. "Relax. He's a good doctor, he'll take care of you. Just be glad your friend convinced you to bring it up, or you'd have been sick as a fresh-woke spirit in days and probably ended up losing that leg." Then her expression softened minutely and she added, "And don't worry about the cost. Yes, it's more than I planned for, but turians don't lie. If we say something's going to hurt, it's damn well going to _hurt._ Better I pay that little bit extra so you don't end up rolling on the ground in agony."

Then the doctor returned and she gave him a small nod. "Just relax and let him do his job. And let me worry about the bill."

The doctor hovered over him, needle at the ready. "Just hold still." One more prick of pain, and then the world slowly dissolved into light and color and blissful numbness.

* * *

By the time he came to again, his leg was already carefully bound up in fresh bandage and blissfully void of pain, and when he went to sit up, he came to the startling realization that he was already back in his suit and there was a brand new cast on his arm. And, even more surprisingly, Thie realized that his bad leg, instead of having been placed back into the awkwardly-repurposed plantigrade boot, was now encased in a shiny new boot obviously actually intended for digitigrades.

He climbed to his feet and glanced around in confusion, realizing that the doctor was nowhere in sight. And, come to think of it, neither was Sephira. What had happened while he'd been out?

Walking felt surprisingly alien now that Thie didn't have an infected leg holding him back, and he found himself staggering more often than not when he overcompensated with his bad leg and almost lost his balance. But he managed to make it back to the examination room without causing himself any more injuries and was pleased to find that, as he'd suspected, both turians had returned there and were quietly talking.

For all of about ten seconds.

Then Sephira turned and fixed Thie with a glare that chilled him to the bone.

He froze instantly, and the doctor turned to him with a sympathetic yet disappointed look. "We were just discussing the fact that you're coming down ill with something like a quarian _caculor_ and trying to figure out where it could have come from." He fluttered his mandibles, then asked, "You haven't had your mask off in the past twenty-four hours, have you?"

Thie couldn't answer.

After a moment of silence, Sephira hissed deep in the back of her throat and stormed over to jab a talon into Thie's chest, hard enough to knock the wind out of him. "Are you _insane?!_ You're on _Palaven,_ a _dextro world!_ Literally _everything_ is compatible with your biochemistry, and you _took your mask off?!"_ She threw up her hands. "And here I thought _Axilus_ was an idiot! Are you _trying_ to get yourself killed?!"

Thie tried to say something, but Sephira cut him off and grabbed his wrist. He tried not to notice how her hand practically eclipsed his. "We are going home _immediately_ and you are going to fucking _flood your suit_ with antibiotics if I have to tap in and do it myself! I am _not_ having you die on my watch!" She dragged him towards the door. "Tollak, if you're still in here, come on!"

She dragged him- literally dragged him- all the way to the front of the clinic, angrily throwing a credit chit with the proper amount of credits on it at the poor receptionist. "Come on, Siri, other kid! We're going to buy a shit-fuck-assload of antibiotics for the numbskull who _couldn't keep his mask on in a hostile environment!"_

Siri and Kel, already on their way to Sephira's side, both skidded to a stop. Siri's eyes grew wide as moons behind her mask. "You took your mask off?"

Kel sounded a little less flabbergasted, hanging his head with a sigh. "See, I _told_ you it was a bad idea to keep pulling your mask off for every little thing, but you wouldn't listen... Wait 'til Raik hears."

Sephira whirled around and jabbed a talon into Kel's chest. "You _knew_ about this?"

Kel winced. "Uh, well, yes... But I thought he'd be okay! Maybe just get a little sick, is all..."

"He's a quarian! Almost no immune system! Ring any bells?! It could have killed him! It _should_ have killed him! And _you_ should have said something about it earlier!"

"Well, when you put it that way..."

 _"Ugh."_ Sephira shook her head hard, clacking her mandibles against the plates behind her jaw, then pivoted again and strode for the door. "Come on. We're going to stop by the general store just down the street and stock you all up with antibiotics and painkillers so this hopefully doesn't happen again. And maybe pick up some ryncol..." she added under her breath.

The heat hit Thie like a train again, and he struggled to twist away from Sephira's grip, gasping a little as the air in his helmet quickly heated up beyond breathability, at least as far as he was concerned. It was like being in a small, form-fitting oven, and he wanted _out._ But she held on like an impassable vise, flashing him dark, annoyed looks every so often, and just kept walking, dragging him along behind her. He suddenly found himself very thankful for the new medical boot.

The store was, thankfully, air conditioned as well, and Sephira let go of him the second they stepped through the doors only to whirl around and jab a talon into his face, hissing, "Don't. Move." before vanishing off into the depths of the establishment.

Thie was more than happy to oblige, moving only to lean against the wall next to where Tollak had uncloaked. The turian gave him an odd look. "Why'd you take your mask off on Palaven, of all places?"

He groaned. Everyone was asking and he was getting tired of answering. "Because I was already sick, all right? I figured it couldn't hurt, but I was wrong. I get it. I fucked up. Leave me alone about it already."

"You got Mom on the warpath." Tollak snorted and shook his head. "I don't think anyone's going to be leaving you alone about it, not for a good, long while."

Thie groaned again and closed his eyes. "Keelah, I want to go home..."

Siri edged up beside him, eyes still wide as plates. Thie didn't notice. When she spoke, she scared the living daylights out of him. "Are you a biotic?" she whispered, sounding awestruck. "I mean, I heard one existed, but I didn't think- I- I mean, I thought he'd be..." Her voice shrunk back into her with the rest of her body. "... taller..."

"Thanks," Thie sarcastically replied, rolling his eyes. "Yeah, I'm biotic. Don't ask me how, I don't want to talk about it. Actually, just don't mention it. Ever. I'm trying to forget it, myself."

"Okay." Siri was quiet for a moment. Then she leaned against the wall beside Thie and asked, in a quiet voice, "What happened to your leg?"

Thie stiffened.

Kel tried to butt in. "It's probably not a good idea to ask, he's kind of touchy about it-"

"No, let's hear it," Tollak interrupted, suddenly very interested in the conversation. "I want to know how my idiot brother found not only a quarian, but the first _biotic_ quarian I've ever heard of, on a training ship. We've got time."

Siri looked horrified. "You don't have to tell us! I mean, I didn't know- I'm sorry!" She buried her face in her hands. "Oh, I'm _so_ sorry, I didn't know it was-!"

"No, it's fine." Thie inhaled slowly through his nose and let it back out. "I should probably talk about it. Might make it a... little easier to sleep."

"Are you sure?" Kel looked concerned, placing a hand on Thie's shoulder which he quickly shrugged off. "I know it's kind of, you know... a bad memory. You don't have to talk about it."

"I have to. If I don't, it'll just keep making it impossible to sleep, and I'll be useless." Thie closed his eyes and steeled himself, taking a long, slow, deep breath.

And then Sephira showed up before he could even get a word out and shoved a bag into Thie's hands. "If you're not swimming in antibiotics in ten seconds, I'll have the drone do it for you. And trust me, you do _not_ want me to have the drone do it for you."

Startled out of his skin for the billionth time- he was beginning to think he should keep a tally- Thie blinked at her, then hurriedly reached into the bag, removed the antibiotics from their box, and carefully replaced the now-empty nodes in his suit with fresh medicine, noticing out of the corner of his eye that Kel and Siri were doing the same thing. Then he did the same with the painkillers she'd provided, and slipped what excess there was into an empty pocket. He set his suit to inject more than enough antibiotics to keep him healthy, then nodded to Sephira before turning his eyes to the ground. "... I'm sorry, Mistress Actinus."

"You damn well should be. Don't make me worry like that." He flinched at the steel in her voice. "Come on. Let's get back to the apartment. I haven't eaten shit today and I'm pretty sure Ax has probably eaten everything Aephis fixed for breakfast."

"Right." Thie glanced up at Kel, who flashed him a bright smile beneath his mask. Then he nodded to Sephira. "Lead the way, ma'am."

* * *

The walk back was much less grueling than the trip to the clinic now that some clouds had lazily rolled over the sun, dropping the temperature like a rock. Now instead of overheating, Thie found himself shivering slightly beneath his suit and wishing he had the money to invest in an environmental control unit for his suit specifically to avoid situations like what he was experiencing on Palaven. Thankfully, whatever the doctor had done made it much easier to walk, so he wasn't stumbling around in pain anymore.

That didn't mean he was any happier to see the twenty-three flights of stairs again.

That climb was more painful than it should have been, and not because of his leg. For some reason, the turians apparently decided that the stairs needed to be double the height of the average stair, which meant that while Tollak and Sephira climbed them easily, the quarians were left almost crawling up them. Thie was exhausted after the first flight, and there were still twenty-two more to go.

And reaching the top didn't make anything better, because they were immediately met, once they entered the apartment, with a very irritated-looking Aephis.

"You're angry," Aephis stated, staring at Sephira, and Thie felt his blood run cold. "What happened?"

Sephira gestured in Thie's direction, still fuming. "That idiot decided to take his mask off _in a hostile environment!"_

She was about to continue, but Aephis shushed her, tapping a finger against her mouth. "Shhhhhhhushushushhh. Do not do the yelling. You do enough yelling. Allow me." He turned to Thie and asked, "Is this true?" and before he could answer turned back to Sephira and said, "Shhh. Go sit down. Eat something. Hug your son. Watch the news with both of your sons. Let me handle this."

Just like that, Sephira deflated and nodded, brushing her cheek against Aephis's. "Thank you, dear."

Aephis made an odd sort of purring noise as she passed, then turned back to Thie. "Is what she said true?"

Thie barely managed a nod.

"Oh, good." Then before Thie's brain could catch up, something slammed into his gut with the force of a rampaging krogan and he dropped like a rock, landing hard on his face (well, mask). "I've been wanting to do that since last night."

"Thie!" Behind him, Kel jumped as if he wanted to help, but quickly backed away when Aephis levelled a dark glare at him. Instead, he remained where he was, eyes growing wider and wider behind his mask. Siri whimpered and clambered over the couch. "Thie, are you okay?"

Thie groaned, propping himself up with his good arm and pressing his forehead into the floor. Fuck. Now his head was swimming and his ears ringing, his abdomen had transformed into a pulsing ocean of pain, and he was pretty sure he'd thrown up a little in his helmet. "I'm... ouch..." He took a moment to breathe, then replied through gritted teeth, "I'm fine..."

"Don't kill him, dear," Sephira called from the den, where she'd curled up on the floor with Axilus's head in her lap. "We can't afford having the fleet park over Cipritine out of spite." Despite her words, she didn't sound all too concerned. With a yawn, she tapped at her omni-tool and her drone, Solas, appeared at her side again. "Solas, what did I miss while I was out?"

"You have eight messages and fourteen missed calls from your father, Lady Sephira," came the drone's chipper response.

Aephis and Sephira both froze solid, Aephis as he was about to begin yelling and Sephira as she reached for the drink Tollak offered her. They exchanged a look and simultaneously muttered, "Fuck."

Axilus perked up. "Grandma and Grandpa! I forgot they were here!"

Aephis rounded on Axilus, mandibles fluttering in distress. "You _knew?!"_

Thie struggled to sit up, casting Kel a bewildered look. "What's going on?" he asked over a private channel, rubbing idly at his gut. It still ached, but his suit had automatically injected a decent dose of painkillers the second it read the sudden flare of adrenaline in his system, which had dulled the throbbing considerably. Now, instead of feeling like he was going to vomit out his intestines, he just felt like he was going to vomit. Still disconcerting, but much more preferrable. "Am I missing something?"

Kel shrugged helplessly and reached down to help Thie to his feet. "I don't know? It looks like Mistress Actinus's parents are in town and don't necessarily like Major Madelivio, or maybe it's the other way around and he doesn't like them..."

Luckily, Aephis chose that moment to groan and whine, "Seph, you _know_ your dad hates my guts, why didn't you _warn_ me?"

"I forgot! I've been busy!" Sephira didn't sound too happy either, flipping through email after email with a growing frown. "My dad is asking if you're in town... I think I'll just pretend that message got lost in transit so I don't have to sit through a vid-lecture." One of the emails vanished and Sephira closed out of the rest with a sigh.

After a second, Aephis straightened up. "I'm going to take the kids to the armory."

"Aephis..."

"They'll need new guns, especially now that Ax is out of boot camp. And I don't think these two have shield generators." Thie and Kel exchanged a confused shrug.

"Aephis."

"And I don't think they even own guns- do you own guns?" Thie shook his head slowly, steadily growing more and more confused. "I thought so. So if these kids are going to be travelling with my boy, I want them armed. Maybe we'll run by the HC Arena while we're out."

"Aephis!"

"What?" Aephis clacked his mandibles against his jaw. "You know your father doesn't like me- hell, he hates my damn guts!- and the kids need guns, and I want to check what they learned in boot camp! It'll work out perfectly! Just ask your father, I'm sure he'd agree that not having to see me would make his goddamn week!"

"Aephis, you're not going to be able to get out of having to make nice with my father. You know that, right?" Sephira crossed her arms and raised a brow plate in his direction.

Aephis huffed hard enough to rattle his nasal plates. "Yes, I know that. But the least you can do is let me enjoy my freedom while it lasts. And let me spoil the boys, I haven't seen them in months."

Sephira sighed and pressed a hand to her forehead. "Aephis..."

"C'mon, Mom! Let us go!" Tollak suddenly seemed to be full of energy, practically bouncing on the tips of his toe claws in excitement. "New guns! A combat sim! C'mon, pleeeease?"

"Tollak, you're on medical leave. The last thing you need is a combat sim."

"Not so," Aephis chirped, and Sephira groaned. "You know what the best cure for illness is? Combat. A good, long battle can do wonders, just trust me. I know from experience. Ten minutes on the battlefield will put a spring in the step of even the most sickly turian. It'll be good for him!"

"Aephis, don't encourage him..."

"Pleeease, Mom?" Tollak did the best approximation of the human expression "puppy-dog eyes" Thie had ever seen on a turian. "It's better than lying in bed all week, right? This way I'm getting exercise and working on my combat skills, right? Right?"

"Fine!" Sephira made a vague motion in the air, scowling. "Fine. Go on, go fuck around with the combat sim. But I warned you, Aephis, you can't say I didn't."

Aephis cracked a smile. "I know. Ax, go get ready. This is going to be fun."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Since Palaven is a desert planet (and based off of Garrus's comments if you take him to Therum in ME1 ["Man, and I thought _Palaven_ was hot"]) it's probably really stupid hot during the summer, so I'm working on an estimation of the temperature being around 63 ºC (or 145 ºF) by midday for the fic.
> 
> Poor quarians. They don't have environmental control units in their suits and they're on Palaven in the middle of summer. That heat and no AC is not a good mix.
> 
> Thanks again to user NoisyNoiverns for ideas, dialogue, lore, and the entire section on turian albinism!


	12. Forget Swiss Army Knife, You're a Swiss Army Toolshed

Thie had thought that Axilus and Tollak's enthusiasm meant that they would leave for the combat sim immediately. It wasn't that he didn't like Sephira, and it wasn't that he was excited about getting new guns and whatever nonsense Aephis had mentioned. It was that he was looking forward to getting a shield generator; after the mess with the slavers and the human colony, he'd started to think that maybe if he'd had shields, he'd have been able to get away. Maybe stockpiling shield mods was going to become a lifesaver and therefore might be a habit worth getting into. So the idea of having access to military-issue shield generators, and with a turian military officer willing to pay for the mods, even, was rather exciting, and he was more than ready to get going, because the sooner he protected himself, the better.

Axilus, however, appeared to have a different idea.

"Whoa! Dad, Dad, Dad!" Thie groaned when he heard the turian's enthusiastic tone, knowing immediately that their chances of leaving any time soon had just dropped to less than zero. Axilus came running up with a piece of his father's armor in hand, mandibles fluttering madly in his excitement, and he shoved it up into Aephis's face. "This is an A-Spec insignia!"

"A-Spec?" The three quarians exchanged a confused glance, while Tollak leaped up and raced over for a look of his own.

"Whoa, hey! Dad, where did you find this?" Tollak sounded dumbfounded, snatching the armor away from his brother and closely examining it. Axilus yelped and jerked it back, and Aephis sighed.

"Boys, boys, enough. Don't fight over my armor."

Kel waved a hand. "What's A-Spec?" He asked once he thought he caught Aephis's attention, sounding just as confused as Thie felt. "Is there something I'm missing?"

"Right, I forget you're not turians." Aephis flared his mandibles in pride. "Well, you know how every now and then, you'll hear about some pirate crew taking over a tiny colony, blowing everything that tries to get close out of the sky? And then a few days later, all of a sudden the colony's been reclaimed again?"

Kel blinked and threw a glance at Thie. "I guess...?"

"Hmm..." Aephis paused, then asked, "Did you hear about Taetrus a few weeks back?"

Thie blinked. He remembered hearing something about a Taetrus, some backwater turian colony that had only just begun to take off when some big-shot merc group descended from the heavens like a swarm of insects and took it over in days. He'd gotten the bulletin on it one day, and then another literally the next about how Taetrus had been liberated or some shit by some turian Special Ops force. "Wait a second, is A-Spec the SpecOps group that took out the mercs on Taetrus overnight?"

Aephis beamed. "That's the one. Think of it as a sort of organic orbital strike. You want something done in a day? You call Blackwatch. Want it done in a few hours?" His mandibles spread in a wide, dopey grin. "You call the Atmospheric Strike Special Operations Regiment. A-Spec, for short."

"Wait, but how does that work?" Kel asked, shaking his head. "I heard those mercs were blasting everything they saw out of the sky. How could they have gotten close enough to do anything?"

Aephis chuckled and leaned back, fondly running a talon around the raised edge of the A-Spec emblem on his armor. "We don't deploy like regular troops." Kel and Thie shared a wide-eyed stare at the use of the personal pronoun. "See, we're special soldiers. Instead of a ground insertion, where the dropship lands on the colony and lets us off, we come in from orbit. They give us these special pods- call 'em the AR-Pods, officially, but everyone else calls them 'tears of the spirits', or just Tears- that are designed for atmospheric reentry, toss us in, lock it up, and drop it down. A lot harder to hit a lot of little things coming in at once than one big ship all on its own."

Axilus and Tollak looked like they were having a religious experience, eyes wide and mouthes gaping. Tollak managed to get his act together enough to gasp, "You're A-Spec, Dad?"

"Damn straight I am." Aephis looked far too proud, but Thie supposed, all things considered, that that was okay. "Why do you think everyone we meet salutes me on sight? It ain't because I'm just a major, that's for sure."

"But- how did you take out a whole merc organization overnight?"

"Let's just say we're damn good soldiers and leave it at that." Aephis flicked his head to the side in what Thie assumed to be a display of pride. "There's a reason training to become A-Spec takes four years for the basics alone. And that doesn't even include the mandatory sims." He chuckled. "We're so damn good, we don't even have to flirt half the time. The sex partners just fall into our laps."

Sephira chose that moment to come running down the hall and dive into Aephis's lap, fluttering her mandibles. "I heard a punchline begging to be made."

"Weren't you talking to your father?" Aephis raised a brow plate.

"Yep." Sephira leaned up to nuzzle him, then hopped up. "And I'd better get back before he decides filicide is the only solution to the problem that is our relationship. Love you." And then she practically sprinted back down the hallway, and Thie gave Aephis a bewildered look.

Aephis shrugged. "Her dad hates me because I dared look at his daughter. Shoulda seen how pissed he got when we got married. I don't think he's let himself believe it even happened, I'm pretty sure he's just pretending we're still girlfriend and boyfriend and the kids were adopted." He shrugged. "Or a twisted joke by the spirit of Palaven themself."

"Your family is weird," Kel bluntly stated.

He just shrugged again. "No more than most turian families. Actually, I'm pretty sure we're more functional than ninety percent of the families here in Cipritine... but then again, I'm just a military grunt, what do I know?" Then he paused and grinned. "Oh, wait." Then he just laughed at his own private joke and stood. "I'm going to put this armor on, now, if you boys don't mind. And then we can leave before Trierceo shows up and kicks my ass out the window."

As Aephis left, Thie turned to Axilus and slowly shook his head. "Axilus Madelivio, your family is fucking insane."

Ax just grinned. "You think _we're_ bad? You should see my extended family, meet Grandpa Octyrus and Grandma Theris. Neither of them is quite all there anymore. Probably from the shockwaves."

Thie's eyes grew wide. "Shockwaves, what the _fuck_ \--?"

"And done!" Aephis boomed, loud enough to scare the bejeesus out of Thie for the ninetieth time. He looked much more imposing with the heavy armor on, and Thie had a brief flashback to the screaming mountain of terror that had awakened him the night before. "I get a special discount if I wear my armor into the store. Something about 'good publicity' or some shit. I dunno."

From down the hall, Thie heard a faint, "But, Dad! He's wearing his _armor!_ It's fucking _hot!"_ and decided he didn't want to know. Ever.

Axilus popped up like one of those creepy human toys and grinned. "C'mon, Thie! Do I need to give you a hand up, or can you make it on your own?"

Thie just glared at him, stood up on his own, then flicked a Throw in Axilus's direction.

Aephis stared at him as Axilus went soaring across the room and slammed into the wall, eyes wide as plates. Internally, Thie cursed. Not this again... "So. That was?"

"Don't ask," Thie grumbled, eyes narrowing. "I'll explain later. Let's just leave."

"Well, we could've left right now, except now I have to go pick Axilus up out of the bathroom. Good job on that, by the way, great idea to throw a turian adolescent the size of a tank into a flimsy apartment wall."

Thie flinched.

Aephis grinned. "I'm only joking. That was impressive, and I'm sure Ax isn't hurt. His plates are too thick. Right, son?" he called, and chuckled when he was answered with a quiet keening. "Yep, he's fine."

Thie grumbled and made his way over to the door, impatiently crossing his arms. After a moment's thought, he polarized his visor to its maximum setting, and contently noticed Siri and Kel hurrying along to do the same thing. "Come on, Axilus," he called. "We don't have all day."

Axilus shambled out of the bathroom with a pout. "You're cruel."

"You didn't figure that out back on the slaver ship with those batarians?"

"What batarians?" Aephis, Kel, and Siri all perked up immediately, and Tollak looked concerned.

Thie shook his head. "That's a story for another time. Let's go, unless Major Madelivio wants to wait and see if it's faster to travel by a swift kick to the ass."

"Yeah, let's not." Aephis opened the door and hurried through. "Come on, kids."

* * *

The walk took much less time than the walk to the clinic had, but maybe it was just Thie, considering he hadn't exactly been aware for half of the trip to the clinic, plus the temperature had dropped drastically in the time it had taken for them to get back outside. Maybe it was just that walking when he wasn't roasting inside his own suit made time feel like it went by quicker. Or maybe it was the fact that Aephis Madelivio had legs that were far too long for any turian and took strides so wide that the quarians had to jog to keep up.

Either way, it was only about ten minutes before they arrived at the armory, which, true to turian standards, was impossibly large and way too adequately stocked. Thie had never seen so many guns in one place before. Except for the time the entirety of the Migrant Fleet Marines had stopped by the _Olyna,_ but that hardly counted.

The second they stepped inside, the manager, who was, surprisingly, a turian, despite all the rumors that turians had about as much business sense as a vorcha did common, did a double-take and stopped cold, instantly snapping a salute. "Oh! Major Madelivio! It's an honor, sir!"

Aephis returned the salute and nodded. "At ease, sir. I'm just here to stock these kids up." He sniffled dramatically, pretending to wipe away a tear. "They grow up so fast."

Kel, ever oblivious, asked, "Sir, do turians even cry?" to which Aephis immediately replied, "Yeah, but it's just a whole lot of screaming."

"Right away, sir. I know just the thing." The turian buzzed over to a rack of assault rifles, lifting one particularly sleek model up. The two younger turians immediately started whispering. "This is the CM-37 Phaeston, our newest model. 86-shot heat capacity and capable of dropping a krogan from 60 meters, without upgrades. Compatible with any and all mods you'll find on the market, and one of the lightest and most versatile assault rifles you'll ever see. It's our most popular rifle and a must-have for any beginning turian soldier. Could I interest you-"

The poor man was cut off by Tollak suddenly shoving Axilus away from the display. "No way, I'm older, so I get it!"

"Bullshit!" Axilus shouted, shoving him back. "That rifle's wasted on the likes of you! I mean, come on, you nimrod, a sniper with an assault rifle is about as useful as Palaven's eyes!"

"Hey! I'm personally offended by that!"

"Good, you should be!"

Kel nudged Thie and murmured, "What do you think they mean by "useful as Palaven's eyes"?"

Aephis sighed. "The spirit of Palaven is said to be blind. Don't ask, you're better off not getting Axilus started on turian mythology. He's memorized all the lore available. Spirits, he can even do the voices." Then he held up his hands and sighed, and said, "Boys, boys, don't fight. You can each get one."

Axilus and Tollak separated immediately, gaping. "Wow, are you serious, Dad?" "No way! Thanks, Dad!"

"Yes, I'm serious." He glanced at the manager, who looked greatly confused and concerned, and nodded. "Get them both one." Then, in a low voice, he added, "And make the one you give to the darker one custom. Put the A-Spec emblem on it somewhere prominent. I'll pay extra."

"Right away, sir." The manager tapped on his omni-tool, then looked back up. "What else can I do for you?"

"Well, Tol here needs to look at snipers, and Ax needs a shotgun." He clapped a hand on Axilus's shoulder, then smiled and added, "And this idiot needs a biotic amp."

"A biotic-? Ah, yes, right away. Shall we look at snipers or shotguns first?"

Aephis looked to the quarians. "Any preferences?"

Thie gave a little start. "I, uh- what do you mean?"

"I mean, what sort of weapons do you suit- ah, you three want?"

"What do you, uh, mean?"

"Spirits, kid, it isn't that hard." Aephis huffed. "You're travelling with my son, yes? Well, that means I'm suiting you up with some guns. Learn, live, deal. What guns are you interested in?"

Thie started fidgeting nervously. Keelah, he hated it when he was put on the spot. "Uh... well, I, uh, personally, I'd rather a shotgun, I guess..."

"Shotguns it is." Aephis clapped a hand down on Thie's shoulder, and Thie tried very hard to suppress his surprised jolt. "Which way?"

"This way, sirs." The manager buzzed on over to another display and picked up another model, droning on about all of its selling points.

Thie managed to block him out and peered at some of the cheaper shotgun models, wincing when he noticed the price. Ancestors, trying to buy even _part_ of one of these guns would force him to sell himself into slavery. "Uh, this one looks, um, okay-" he started, though Aephis immediately cut him off and yanked him away from the display.

"Oh, _spirits,_ kid! If you're going to be with my son," Thie winced at his choice of words, "you're not going to have a piece of junk like _that_ to protect you. How about this?" Ignoring the manager's offended sputtering at the 'piece of junk' comment, Aephis picked up one monster of a shotgun and shoved it into Thie's hands, grinning. "There you go, the M-22 Eviscerator! Capable of blowing someone's head off at range, and blowing their entire goddamn torso apart up close. _That'll_ keep you safe."

"I, uh- Are- are you sure?" Thie adjusted his grip on the shotgun, eyes widening behind his mask. He'd thought it would be heavier, but the way it sat in his grip was... well, now he knew what turians were talking about when they said a gun was made for them. But still, the price tag on it was enough to make him feel a little sick, even if someone else was buying.

"Damn straight I'm sure. You might just be a quarian, but I want the best for my son's companions." Aephis paused. "Well, being a quarian you really don't have much strength, so you'll probably _need_ a hand-cannon like that if you want to survive. Huh. Works out perfectly." Then, just like that, he ignored Thie and turned around to Axilus. "What about you, son?"

"Dad, I like this one!" Axilus grinned dopily over the gleaming shotgun in his hands, showing it happily to his father. "The M-23 Katana. Feels like I was born to hold this gun!"

"That's gay, son."

"Dad, I'm gay."

"Axilus, you're bi, but I guess that's sort of gay. So that's perfect. Sold!"

"Wait, wait, wait, what does 'bi' mean?" Thie asked, frowning. His translator hadn't given him a decent translation at all; whatever the fuck "Think, then code. Twice in the last song" meant, it wasn't what they were using it for. Hell, it didn't even make sense. He made a mental note to update his translation software as soon as possible.

Aephis, though, didn't answer, just waved ambiguously and said, "Not now, kid, I'm buying guns," and happily pranced off to the sniper display after prying the display shotgun from Axilus's hand. After a moment of questioning the meaning and purpose of his life, Thie followed.

By the time he got there, Axilus's brother had already picked up a sleek sniper rifle model and was happily hefting it up, testing the weight and balance against his own thin body. The manager was saying, "The Krysae's knockback is negligible, so it shouldn't be too much of a hassle, even for someone as slight as you. It's deadly accurate up to 700 meters and compatible with most weapons mods- many of which we sell here, if you're interested." And, after a pause, he added, "And it does have a quite charming contrast with your plates, if I may," to which Aephis mumbled the same thing he'd said to Axilus moments ago about being gay as fuck.

Tollak didn't even hesitate. "I'll take it. Where are the tactical cloak modules?"

"Tol, you already have a tac cloak."

"Yes, but it breaks if a fly so much as breathes on me. That's just about as useless during battle as Axilus is with girls."

"Hey! I've had a lot of sex with girls!"

"Not what I meant, Axilus."

"Boys, boys, please, not in the store." Aephis sounded amused despite what he was saying. "All right, though, Tol, we can take a look. But you're the one who has to explain that one to your mother, not me."

"I'm sure she'll be fine with me getting a tactical cloak that doesn't suck krogan dick."

"That's gay, son."

"Dad, Ax is the gay-ish one."

"I know. And that's gay, son."

"You know what? Let's just go find the tac cloaks."

"Right away, my gay son."

"Dad, please."

"What?"

"I'm ace, can you knock it off with the gay jokes? Or at least save them for Axilus." Tollak's voice turned mocking. "Or the quarian in blue."

Thie stiffened. "Hey!"

Kel snickered and elbowed him lightly. "C'mon, Thie, take a joke."

"It wasn't a joke," Tollak deadpanned. "I know gay, I have to live with Axilus. And he's just bi. My gaydar goes off the charts every time I look at the blue suitrat."

"Tollak, _manners!"_

"Oh, that's rich, coming from _you,_ Dad."

Aephis huffed. "You know what? Let's just go find the tac cloaks. And you can drop it before I decide you don't get one, and _you_ get to explain to Mom why you're stuck with a shitty model."

"Dick." Tollak huffed and followed the manager, who hurried off after looking briefly like he was regretting every second of the experience, A-Spec officer or no.

It took less than five minutes for them to figure out which tactical cloak to get for Tollak, and around seven for them to find Axilus a suitable biotic amp. When Aephis asked Thie, however awkwardly, if he wanted a new amp, he just shook his head, and so they'd moved on to finding the other two quarians a gun.

Siri took no time at all in finding a pistol that she could use without much experience with weapons, especially after the manager awkwardly recommended the M-3 Predator once he finished swallowing his own tongue upon realizing that none of the three quarians had any military experience whatsoever. After the demonstion of the gun's capabilities at the in-store shooting range, where he attempted to teach Siri how to use a pistol in battle and ended up watching her squeeze the trigger while screaming in incoherent terror for five minutes, Aephis decided that a trip to the combat sim was an absolute must.

Kel was much easier, though he took a little longer when deciding on an SMG model. The manager seemed relieved when he enthusiastically decided on an M-9 Tempest, though he looked rather terrified again once Kel mentioned his utter lack of combat experience and the fact that he'd never even held a gun before in his life. Aephis was a little less worried once a stop by the shooting range confirmed that while Kel was inexperienced, he at least wasn't as terrified of the gun as poor Siri was.

Then he took Thie by the shooting range on a whim, handing him the shotgun he'd given him before and telling him to try to hit the dummies in the back of the range. The kickback put Thie right on his ass, and he was quite surprised to learn that not only had he hit the dummy, he'd actually blown its straw head right off, and admitted that he, too, had no combat expertise.

Aephis spent a long five minutes cursing incoherently in the turian closed dialect, then angrily declared that they were going to stop by a combat sim if it killed them.

Thie sincerely hoped he was just angry about the lack of combat expertise and not saying that a trip to the combat sim could legitimately kill them. At this point, he honestly wouldn't be surprised if it was the latter, considering the turian obsession with honor and military prowess.

Still. It was a frightening thought.

Then Aephis dragged them all over to get omni-tool upgrades, and Thie spent several minutes poring over a selection of drone programs before quietly picking up a combat drone for himself and Kel and a defense drone for Siri.

Aephis figured out what he was doing and managed to talk the manager into selling him an alpha-prototype version of a sentry turret program the manufacturer was putting through trials, presenting that to Siri with the exclamation, "So at least _something_ can shoot for you without screaming about it." Siri blushed so hard that Thie could see the glow through her visor, and briefly pitied her.

Once they stopped by the shield generators, however, Aephis turned around and gave Axilus a long, strange look. "Son, do you even have armor?"

Axilus paused, blinked slowly, then shook his head.

Aephis cursed. "All right, armor it is. C'mon, the shields will have to wait, they're good for nothing if you don't have armor to fix them to. Or a suit," he added after glancing at the trio of quarians.

Luckily, it took Axilus all of five minutes to decide on a set of armor, and Thie had a very hard time not staring once he was fully kitted out with it. He'd chosen classic turian heavy armor in sleek black and blue as dark as the midnight sky, and _damn_ if he didn't look good in it. Thie eventually managed to tear his gaze away once he noticed Tollak smirking in his direction, and glared at him until he turned away, though the smirk remained.

Then, back to the shield generators. Axilus and Tollak got a standard-issue mod each, but when Thie and Kel reached for the same model, Aephis stopped them cold.

"Oh, no, you don't." The towering turian pushed them towards another display, full of mods that were easily ten times more expensive than the ones he'd bought for his own kids. "You're quarians, which means you don't get armor like the boys do. So you need good shields. _Damn_ good." Then he flicked a mandible out and added, "Each of you gets three."

Thie's jaw dropped. "Are you- are you serious?"

"Fuck yeah, I'm serious. Here, let me help you get them on."

The manager was all too happy to help Aephis and the quarians get the shield mods attached and properly calibrated, and Thie stared in wonder at his own arm as a glowing blue-violet barrier pulsed into existence an inch above his skin, flaring once as it charged, then fading until he couldn't see it anymore. He could certainly still feel it, though.

Then Aephis muttered, "Now, hold still," and drew a gun, and Thie's heart dropped into his stomach.

Siri's shields flared and she squealed almost as loudly as the pistol's report, eyes so large that her glowing irises were framed on all sides by white. She remained standing for all of ten seconds, then dropped like a rock, and Axilus hissed, "Dad!"

Aephis blinked down at the trembling heap of quarian and flicked out a mandible, mumbling, "Shit, that was the nervous one, wasn't it?"

"Yes!"

"Don't tell your mother."

Kel dropped to his knees, and for a moment, Thie feared he'd fainted, too, much like he was quite inclined to, but then Kel started gently shaking Siri and hissing, "Hey, wake up, you're okay!" for a moment before giving up and hacking into her suit to inject her with a stim.

She jolted back upright with a gasp and immediately curled up to begin hyperventilating, and Aephis groaned and knelt at her side. "Look, I'm sorry, I forgot you were the nervous one. Next time, I'll shoot the short boy one."

Thie didn't feel like that was much better, although he couldn't help but be relieved that it wouldn't be him.

Then Aephis sighed and stood, gently escorting Siri to her feet. "Listen, I need you to take deep, slow breaths, okay? Relax. Hyperventilating like that just makes it worse." And with a gentleness Thie didn't know the brute could possibly possess, he managed to slowly get Siri to calm down. Then he patted her head and said, "I'm sorry. Feel better?"

Siri was still shaking, but nodded very slowly and squeaked, "A little." Again, Thie felt a pang of pity for her.

"All right, then." Aephis sighed again and glanced back at his two sons, then back at the quarians. "Your combat skills are quite possibly the saddest thing I've ever seen in my entire life, and I got to watch Axilus grow up. I know you probably don't like it, but you're going to a combat sim, and I'm going to teach you how to use those guns I'm paying for."

Siri made a rather pathetic noise. "Does that mean you're going to shoot at me again?"

"Not me." Aephis grinned. "First match is you three against the boys. I wanna see what they learned before I figure out how to go about it for the rest of you. C'mon, let's go pay."

Thie shared a bewildered look with Kel, reluctantly trailing along after the now-chattering brothers following like puppies after their father. Siri drifted along behind Thie, almost clinging to his arm. "Don't worry," Thie said after a moment. "I'll, uh, try to keep you safe. I don't think combat sims actually hurt you."

"Nah." Kel sounded nervous despite his attempt to be upbeat. "I'm looking at the website for Cipritine's combat sim now. The rounds are special, they just numb you wherever they hit you instead of causing actual damage or knocking you out. Says they use blanks, though, so I guess if you're not careful, it _could_ hurt... but it wouldn't _actually_ hurt you. No blood, just bruising. They don't allow hand-to-hand because there's no way to reduce the risk for that, and biotics are limited to non-telekinetics only."

Thie sighed and shrugged. "Not using my biotics might be good for me. My implant's felt weird ever since the deal with the..." He tensed as the memories began to rise and quickly pushed them back down, swallowing hard. "You know."

Siri looked confused, but wisely didn't ask. Kel hurried over to wrap an arm around Thie's shoulders, and this time, Thie didn't push him away. "Don't worry. I know what you mean, you don't have to relive it. Just relax."

He took a long, slow breath, trying to slow his now-racing heart. It was hard to stop thinking about it once it came up, but he'd be damned if he didn't try. "They want to know, though."

"I know. Me and Crux'll tell them. You won't even have to be in the room."

"Thanks." He hung his head. "Keelah, I must seem so weak..."

"You're not weak if you live through what you lived through, Thie." Kel squeezed him in an awkward one-armed side-hug. "No one has the right to call you weak because it gave you some bad memories."

"Maybe."

Kel seemed like he was going to say more, but Thie was relieved when Aephis cut him off, calling, "Oi, kids! Come here and get your guns!" and hurried to oblige.

He'd been captured because he'd been helpless, hadn't been able to defend himself. He hadn't any combat experience. Hadn't known how to fight them off. Now, Thie thought as he held the Eviscerator in his hands, feeling the weight settle like he'd been carrying it all his life, that would never happen again. He'd make sure of it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whee, a boring transition chapter! The next one is going to be full of action and somewhat long, so consider this your warning.
> 
> A-Spec basically came about when I was playing Halo: ODST and asked myself, "What if the turians had an ODST program?" And then one thing led to another and I accidentally ended up creating an entire branch of the turian military. Oops?
> 
> Credit to BadTranslator for a certain something up above. That thing is a blessing when you want to make it clear that just because translators are in widespread use, they're not exactly infallible. You can't convince me it doesn't translate things wrong or make shit up as it goes when it doesn't know what a word means. I bet it's translated Phaeston as "Large Dong" or something equally stupid before. Computers are stupid.


	13. Achievement Unlocked: Maximum Overkill

"Why did we let them talk us into this, again?"

Standing across the arena from a pair of fully-kitted-up turians carrying dangerous-looking guns and even more dangerous smiles, Thie honestly had to wonder.

They'd been ushered onto the field with hardly any explanation, just "Shoot to kill and stay down if you go down. No biotics, no melee," and a pat on the shoulder as the two brothers shared an ominous smile. Then they'd found out that they, three quarians with no military training whatsoever and no idea how to even hold a weapon, let alone hit something with it, were to face one turian fresh from boot camp and another in his sixth year of service, alone and unassisted, with absolutely no warning.

Siri had nearly fainted when the door closed behind them and the match began to initialize. Thie couldn't blame her. The idea of fighting _anyone_ was terrifying right now; they didn't even know how to use the guns they'd so abruptly been given, and Thie still hadn't had the time to set up his combat drone or see if his biotics were functioning once more, and he _knew_ neither Kel nor Siri had set up their drones, either.

Too bad. They could have used Siri's sentry turret. He supposed they'd just have to work with what they had and hope they could stand a chance.

Out of the corner of his eye, Thie could see Siri tighten her grip on her pistol, entire body shaking with nerves. If he could see her hands, he knew they'd be white. She had the gun in a death grip. "Hey," he called, trying not to flinch when she jolted in a mixture of surprise and pure anxiety, "relax. It's just a sim. We'll be okay. Maybe it'll even be fun."

She didn't look convinced, but nodded anyway, nearly jumping out of her skin when the arena VI started speaking in its painfully stiff, halting synthetic voice. He knew it was supposed to sound computerized, but sheesh, that was a bit much. It sounded cheap.

_[Arena matchup: Axilus and Tollak Madelivio versus Thie'Haasn nar Olyna, Kel'Raanis nar Anaid, and Siri'Yanna nar Idenna. Round one. Begin.]_

Deep breath in, let it out slow. Calm his own racing heart. His helmet's defog systems whirred to clear away the bit of fog misting his visor. Okay. This would be fine. Just stay calm. He could do this.

Thie took a step forward, raising his shotgun.

Something hit him hard and fast, square in the center of his visor, and the second step turned into a backwards tumble as his upper body went one way and his lower body another and gravity gleefully took hold to slam him into the ground hard enough to make his vision go white. It took a moment for him to regain his breath, and once he did, he slowly realized that his entire body had, all at once, gone completely numb, courtesy of the arena's standard-issue stun rounds.

From somewhere across the arena echoed a triumphant, "Boom! Headshot!" and the sound of two turians high-threeing.

Siri and Kel stared down at him in horror, unmoving. Thie groaned, dazed and barely able to move his jaw, and ground out, "Get in cover, stupid!"

Kel leaped into action almost immediately and slid smoothly behind a wall as another shot sizzled by, hitting the ground near Thie's head with a digital _twing!_ and firework of synthetic sparks that would have startled him had he been a little more present at the time. As it was, his mind felt like it was distant from his body, and the sound of the round hitting the metal flooring sounded ages away. Stupid snipers.

Siri shook herself out of her shock and dove behind a nearby crate, a terrified wail building in her chest, and promptly ducked into a brace position, shaking so hard she was nearly vibrating. "I knew this was a bad idea...!" she whimpered between panicked gasps, hyperventilating already.

After he was sure he was out of sniping range, Kel opened a private comm link, flagging down her attention. "Listen, maybe we can draw them out!" he shouted, trying to be heard over her frantic gasping. "You keep your head down, okay? I'm gonna see if I can get Axilus to come at us by himself, maybe we can take him out and flank his brother. You with me?"

Siri gave a pathetic little sob in response, but picked up her gun and tightened her grip on the pistol until her hands shook and her knuckles turned white beneath her suit. Privately, she wondered why she'd let herself get involved with the crazy turians in the first place.

Good enough. "Just don't get shot. Stay behind cover." Kel took a deep breath and spared a look back at Thie, wincing when the downed quarian made a pained little groaning sound, then glanced back, counting the seconds between one shot and the next. He'd have to take advantage of the reload cycle between shots if he was going to get anywhere.

_One, two, three, four... now!_

He burst from his cover and rolled behind another crate just in time to watch a shot glance off the floor where he'd been standing milliseconds ago, breath coming hard and fast as adrenaline rushed through his veins. He didn't give himself a second to spare, diving from cover to cover as Tollak shot and missed and shot and missed, using those four seconds to the greatest advantage he could.

Then he slipped up, moved just a second too late, and Tollak found an opening. One round clipped the side of his leg and Kel crashed into the crate he'd been diving for, only a split-second reaction keeping him from smashing his head into the simulated metal at terminal velocity. Jets of pain raced up his arm as something in his wrist made a terrible sound which reverberated through his bones and he tried to bite back a frightened yelp, cradling the limb to his chest. It didn't _look_ broken, though that was hard to tell through a suit, and it definitely hurt, but he had more important things to deal with than an amateur attempt at a diagnosis so he just set his suit to dispense some mild pain medication and carefully shook it out, then turned his attention back to the operation at hand. Just two more bits of cover to go...

And then he slid behind a small wall out of Tollak's sight, rolling to a stop with a stifled whimper as his injured hand slammed into the nearby wall. He cradled it back to his chest, blinking back tears as the pain worsened, and tried to focus on calming his breathing over the bracelet of agony wrapped around his wrist. It could wait, he told himself. Think of Siri. Think of Siri and how you left her wide open, all alone and hyperventilating. A hurt wrist comes behind the safety of his team. He'd learned that much already.

They were close, anyway. Tollak was still shooting, growling angrily every time the sniper reported and a body didn't fall. He was probably shooting at Siri, Kel realized, and that meant he needed to move. Fast.

Once he was close enough to peer around the corner, still panting somewhat from the exertion of diving around like a trained marine when he didn't have the endurance to, he was stupefied to see Axilus lounging on his side, facing away from him and laughing heartily every time Tollak fired.

"C'mon, Tol, I thought you were an ace!" he was saying, gesturing aimlessly with one hand. "And he's one quarian! How did you lose him?"

"I didn't lose him," Tollak seethed from his sniper's perch, "he rolled out of my line of sight. No combat experience, my left spur. How much you wanna bet the red one's got a military parent?"

"Pshh, nah. You see how they react when Dad shoved 'em in and told them they were facing us? None of them has experience. Except maybe Thie, but he doesn't count cuz he's injured."

"Thie's blue, right?" He could hear the smirk in Tollak's voice. "Experience, my ass. I took him down in seconds."

"That's because you spent the whole initialization lining up a shot, you cheating dickass."

"That's a new one. Get that from the humans, did you?"

"Yeah, and this one, too: suck my left asscheek."

"Ooh, touchy. Hold on, Black just peeked out of cover." He tutted. "Rookie move, you can tell they aren't trained. Ten creds says I can pop her in the face too."

"That's a moron's bet, Tol."

They hadn't noticed him yet, he realized, pressing his back against the wall behind him. They didn't know where he'd gone. This was his chance.

His arm still ached, and he couldn't feel the fingers on his right hand through the buzzing pins and needles of just-arriving numbness jabbing into his flesh. Good thing he was just as good at using both of his hands. He shifted the SMG into his left hand, weighing it and taking a moment to get used to the shape and the feel of a gun in his less-dominant hand. Then he peeked around the corner again.

Can't waste any time, he told himself as another report echoed through the arena. Siri needed him to do this. This was his only shot.

Kel took a deep breath and aimed for the back of Axilus's head, holding his breath to steady the gun. He'd only have one shot at this. Needed the accuracy. The second he pulled the trigger, they'd both know he was there. But if he was lucky, only one of them would be left active.

He squeezed the trigger.

And just like that, Axilus was on his feet and shoved the barrel of the shotgun in Kel's face, and Kel swore to the ancestors that he watched his life pass before his eyes as he squeaked, "Wait! That'll kill me!"

Axilus grinned. "Yeah, it would. I'll be nice." And he stepped to the side.

Siri heard the sniper's report and flinched, heart sinking immediately as she realized what had just transpired. "Oh, Keelah," she whispered, burying her head in her hands.

Thie hadn't been wrong when he'd noted her as being of nervous disposition. If anything, he'd drastically underestimated just how easily she panicked. Already, her chest ached and her throat burned as frenetic hyperventilation turned into unstoppable bouts of coughing, and she swore her head was beginning to feel a bit fuzzy as her pulse skyrocketed in pure, unadulterated panic. She didn't know what to do in this situation! She wasn't a combatant, Keelah, she wasn't even supposed to _be_ here! She was supposed to be on her Pilgrimage, not stuck on Palaven, not surrounded by crazy rough-plated giants that could kill her with a glance! And especially not on a battlefield!

Her back pressed against the crate she was using for cover and slowly, her legs gave out, and she slid down the face of the crate until she was sitting and whimpered, "I don't want to be here..." She broke off into another round of coughing, so violent her throat stung, then dropped her head into her hands and just trembled.

She didn't know what to do. Her job was to sit in an engineering department and work her magic on engines and drive cores, not shoot people! She was an engineer, a programmer! And not only that, she was a _child!_ Not a battle-hardened marine, not a wisened adult, just a child too eager to embark on her Pilgrimage, too inexperienced to keep herself safe. Her skills were no use here; it was hard to hurt someone with engineering, unless you had a heavy wrench or an industrial spanner or...

Or a convenient sentry program she'd been given just an hour earlier. Her heart lifted just slightly as the realization bloomed, and she took a moment to peek around the edge of the crate and make sure neither of the Madelivios were paying attention to her before curling up and activating her omni-tool. "Where, oh where are you hiding, sentry...?" she mumbled to herself, flipping through blueprints and journal files until she came across the right program with a triumphant little, "Yes!" and activated it.

Information filled the command screen, bits of data executing and scrolling by so quickly that she couldn't even keep up with it, though she certainly tried her best. She even recognized some of the prompts. Basic programming commands, a simple network, nothing she couldn't handle. She even recognized her omni-tool's identification code in there as it scrolled past. Her chest began to feel a little less tight, her heart began to slow, her breathing relaxed. This was good, this was familiar. She could work with this.

And then the prompts flashed red and her heart dropped as the line _[ALERT: DATA CORRUPTION IN PRIMARY NODE. UNABLE TO EXECUTE COMMAND:QUICKRUN.SENTRY.]_ filled the screen.

Well, they _had_ mentioned it was an alpha-prototype. It had been guaranteed to have a few bugs in the system. But that didn't stop her from panicking.

"No, no, no...!" She desperately opened the data logs, scrolling through it and adjusting codes as quickly as her brain could process the issues. Worry began to rise as she realized that they hadn't come looking for her yet, which was strange, but she quickly pushed it back down and put forth every single bit of concentration she could into repairing the oddly-incomplete data that was supposed to be her sentry turret program.

The screen flashed green again and she sat back in relief, breathing a slow sigh as the initialization continued as if nothing had happened at all. Finally, a bit of hope. If she could just get the sentry up and running, maybe she could stand a chance-

"Nice work on that," came a chipper voice from far above her, and Siri's blood ran cold. "Reminds me of Mom. You an engineer?"

She couldn't make herself look up for a long time, only forcing herself to once she recognized the pair of shadows towering over her unimposing form. Her pistol dropped to the metal paneling with a loud _clank._

Two turians she wouldn't have suspected to be brothers stood over her, the one with the shotgun smiling and the other with the sniper smirking, Kel's stolen Tempest levelled at her head. The darker one, Axilus, brightly said, "Found you!" as if they'd been doing nothing but playing a game of hide-and-seek.

Siri whimpered, drawing back into herself as the terror flared again and her breathing, formerly under control, sped up far beyond safe boundaries, and she whispered, "C-can I surrender...?" as she felt that itch in her throat return full-force.

The brothers exchanged a glance. Then the lighter one, the one holding the SMG, looked down at her and said, "Nah," and pulled the trigger.

It took Thie a few minutes to convince Siri to stop crying once everyone regained enough feeling to exit the arena, and another to lecture Tollak and Axilus about toying with fragile people such as Siri, and how would they feel if someone did that to someone _they_ cared about? To which Tollak made a remark about Thie and Siri and some rather rude going-ons allegedly occurring behind the scenes, and Aephis had to physically pull Axilus and Tollak apart after they got in a rather brutal fistfight which involved a lot of yelling in a closed dialect Thie's translator didn't understand.

Axilus punched Thie in the shoulder as he passed by, mumbling something about owing him one for defending his honor or some turian bullshit. Thie made a mental note to punch Axilus and Tollak both later on.

Kel looked confused, hands shaking and eyes wide behind his mask. "What did I do wrong?" he kept asking, sounding lost. "I did everything right. They didn't know I was there. What did I do wrong?"

Axilus just laughed and happily handed the Tempest back to Kel. "Let me let you in on a secret. The next time you try to shoot someone," he reached over and flicked a small switch on the side of the gun, near the trigger, and Kel's cheeks flushed so brightly that Thie could see the faint bioluminescent glow through his visor, "it helps to turn the safety off first."

Both turians laughed uproariously as Kel attempted to hurry away, head hanging, cradling his wrist against his chest and mumbling something about a sprain.

But Aephis caught him before he could leave, pulled all five of them aside and said, with a broad grin, "The next match is all of you against me. Good luck."

Axilus's eyes nearly bugged out of his head, and Tollak stared blankly for a moment before shouting, "That's not fair!" The three quarians just exchanged a look and meekly made their way back onto the battlefield, followed shortly by two very grouchy turian soldiers and one outlandishly happy A-Spec officer.

The arena VI chimed in with, _[Arena matchup: Major Aephis Madelivio versus Axilus and Tollak Madelivio, Thie'Haasn nar Olyna, Kel'Raanis nar Anaid, and Siri'Yanna nar Idenna. Round one. Begin.]_

Maybe this round would turn out better now that they weren't facing a sniper. All the same, Thie braced himself and took a step forward.

And just like last time, something slammed into him right off the bat, except this time it came from behind, struck him right in the base of the skull where his implant sat in its port, and turned out the lights on its way. He went down like a thrown brick and didn't move.

Tollak sniggered and Aephis called from across the arena, "Hey! No friendly fire!"

The arena VI agreed. _[Penalty awarded to Tollak Madelivio.]_

Axilus snorted. Kel shook his head and hurried behind cover, and Siri did the same, already beginning to panic-cough again. Kel tried to be optimistic anyway. Maybe they could stand a chance, since they had a four-on-one advantage. Plus, two turians against one! That was good, right?

And then an odd red orb came trailing fire  and cute digital murmurs across the battlefield, and Kel watched in confusion as it arced around Siri's wall and struck her hard enough to slam her into the crate right behind her. She collapsed without a sound.

Kel blinked. Axilus made an odd snuffling sound that he vaguely recognized as a failed attempt to muffle laughter. Tollak didn't even try to hide it, just burst into laughter and then vanished into thin air.

"I'll take him out first!" Axilus called to Tollak, and Kel, still stunned from the unfortunate series of rather disturbing events all hitting in rapid-fire succession, watched him glow with a blue aura and then vanish into thin air as well, only to hear a strangled _"grrk!"_ from across the arena and, when he leaned out to watch, see Axilus collapse from where he'd been hanging in the air, Aephis's fist lodged in his throat.

Aephis sighed. "Son, think before you charge next time, please. Oh, and no biotics allowed."

And then he looked up and met Kel's eyes through his visor, and Kel thought to himself, _"Oh, fuck me sideways and call me a vorcha."_

And then his body lit up with an electric blaze as Aephis lazily cast a hand in his direction, lightning dancing over his skin and fireworks exploding behind his eyelids as he grit his teeth, ignored the explosion of warnings and alerts filling his visor's heads-up display, and tried to wait for it to be over, only to feel another Overload strike him with the force of a krogan and take out his legs as if he'd cut the strings on a marionette. He hit the ground hard enough to blur his vision, then made the wise decision to stay where he was and listened to the arena VI make another announcement about a point to Major Aephis Madelivio.

Belatedly, he realized he hadn't turned on his shields. Oops. That might've helped.

Kel couldn't see much from where he'd fallen, especially since his face was half-turned down to the ground, but he could see Siri shift across the way and could imagine her pained moan. Thie still showed no signs of consciousness, which would have been a bit less concerning if it hadn't been the second time he'd been shot in the head. Briefly he contemplated crawling over to check on him, then realized that his body was numb and wouldn't respond to his commands anyway. Nevermind. Probably better to leave him be, anyway.

And around them, the match dissolved into a round of "find the cloaked sniper" as Tollak ran like a chicken, tactical cloak engaged and stealing potshots where he could, while Aephis chased after him, slamming him with Overloads to take out his cloak and Sabotages to take out his sniper, and after about five minutes of the chase, Aephis finally managed to fling an Incinerate around a corner and struck Tollak hard enough that he forgot to cloak again.

To say that the two turians were embarrassed about having been beaten by their father without even using his weapons and while heavily outnumbered would be a grand understatement.

Axilus politely asked, once they evacuated the field, if he could sit out of the next round. Aephis happily obliged and rounded on the quarians, one of which was stumbling around dizzy with what he was sure to be a concussion, another still cradling an injured wrist to his chest, and the last faint from panic and still doubled over coughing, obliviously grinning and saying simply, "You're up."

Siri passed out briefly. When she woke up again a minute or two later, she immediately asked if Aephis was serious, then whimpered when he nodded and ushered them back out onto the floor.

The next match didn't go too well for the quarians, either. In fact, it had begun to feel, in Thie's mind, as if they were just cosmic playthings, especially once he watched Siri go down hard again to an Incinerate and witnessed Kel throw himself over a railing in a desperate attempt to avoid another one, and then realized through the dizzying fog clouding his thoughts that he was the only one left.

Aephis stood on the other side of the arena, mandibles fluttering in amusement.

Thie chose that moment to run like his life depended on it. Which, if you turned your head and squinted, it sort of did.

It wasn't easy. His head felt like an elcor had stepped on it, then tossed him into a varren pit and left him there for an hour or two, his thoughts working slow as molasses and heavy as lead. His legs didn't want to work with him, buckling here and there and dragging behind and tripping him up, and he nearly crashed more than once, only to bounce off the offending wall like it was made of elastic and throw himself back into a desperate sprint around the arena.

Whatever calories the nutrient paste he'd eaten had provided, he was pretty sure he'd burned off in spades. Ancestors, he was going to be starving after this was done.

... If it ever _was._

Aephis cornered him once, and Thie panicked and shot out blindly with his shotgun as he turned on his heel to flee. The turian made a shocked sound and Thie looked to see if he'd hit him, only to see him grinning and fluttering his mandibles in that way he'd come to associate as being the turian version of waggling one's eyebrows mockingly. He immediately turned around and booked it for the railing to do as Kel had, because _fuck that shit._

And then a large, heavily armored arm wrapped around his waist and he had just enough time to think, _"Oh, fuck me,"_ before Aephis threw him bodily into a nearby wall hard enough to knock his visor's display out. He flailed around blindly for a moment while the HUD rebooted, then found himself blinking up at a slowly-swimming ceiling, Aephis mildly standing with one boot on his chest and whistling.

Luckily, the arena VI counted that a victory.

And then, after Thie managed to dizzily stagger his way into the locker room, Aephis gently turned him right back around and told him, "Now it's you and Ax against Tol. I told Tol not to shoot you in the head anymore, so don't worry."

For just a moment, Thie wondered if the ancestors would be angry should he just lie down and let himself die. His head was still foggy, his limbs still wren't responding quite right, his body hurt like a bitch, his implant was buzzing like an angry wasp at the back of his skull, and _holy shit_ these turians would _not_ let him take a break. It was like the slaver ship all over again, except this wasn't actual torture, it was simulated torture, which apparently made it fine, just _fine._ Ancestors grant him strength. And maybe a quick and painless death. Preferrably before he had to do more of this shit.

And then Axilus gave him that smile of his and everything felt a little more okay for about half a second before he realized that holy _fuck_ was that gay. Then he set his suit to inject a stim (which thankfully cleared out the lingering disorientation from his certain concussion) and told himself,  _"I am not a xenophile and I have no interest in xenophilia and have never had interest in xenophilia, especially not for a turian, and especially not for an idiot turian like that idiot, shut up, brain."_

Maybe if he kept telling himself that, he'd eventually believe it.

Fucking fuck fuck. Just focus on the match.

That turned out to be easy, because yet again, the second the match began, Thie was down. But this time it wasn't a headshot, true to Aephis's word.

No, this time Tollak had seen fit to shoot him in the groin.

Thie swore to the ancestors that he saw a new galaxy form out of the stars floating before his eyes. Then he collapsed very slowly, like a felled tree except half as wide and a quarter so tall, and curled up in a small ball, making a very small, high-pitched keening sound he'd never be able to replicate for the rest of his life as agony bloomed through his entire body.

Somewhere through the haze of pure _hurt_  which had replaced the dizzy fog in his head, he heard Aephis roar, _"TOLLAK!"_ and Tollak cheekily reply, "Well, it wasn't a headshot!"

"Tollak, you're _grounded!"_

"I followed the rules!"

And then Axilus pounced on his brother, pinned him to the ground, and started beating the absolute _shit_ out of him. He refused to say afterwards whether he'd done it just to spite his brother or to get back at him for the nasty groin attack, just clapped a hand on Thie's shoulder and nodded towards the locker room. "You should go sit down. Dad said so."

Thie was all too grateful and much too happy to oblige, limping his way to a spot off to the side where he could sit down and curl in on himself in peace. His groin throbbed painfully with each beat of his heart, and though he knew it had only been a blank round, it still hurt all the same, because the material of the bullet didn't matter when you were in such close quarters except to decide whether or not it did more than bruise. Luckily, that meant he'd probably retain all functionality once the trauma of being shot in the groin with a sniper rifle wore off. _Probably._

For a moment, he took the time to thank the ancestors for Sephira's foresight in supplying him and the others with proper medical supplies, then set his suit to dispense a mild dose of painkillers and reveled in the blissful haze that followed.

Once the pain had tapered off into a less-agonizing burn, Thie uncurled himself and set about programming his combat drone, muttering mutinously to himself about siccing it on Tollak the next chance he got. Siri was much too happy to oblige when he asked for some help- apparently Aephis wasn't the only one appalled by Tollak's actions.

The three turians had vanished off again shortly after Thie had gotten into the waiting area, presumably to participate in a match of their own, just the three of them. He couldn't hear much from where he sat, but it didn't sound like the younger ones were doing too particularly well.

And they weren't, which became clear when the match ended after a mere ten minutes. The gates opened up and Aephis strode in, dragging a gasping Axilus along behind him and followed by a pouting Tollak, who had a thin trickle of blood trailing down the side of his head where, Thie assumed, either Aephis or Axilus had gotten in one good blow. It was hard to feel bad for him.

The gate closed behind them and Tollak said, in the most pathetic voice he'd ever heard from the turian, "Dad, can I go take a nap?"

Aephis chuckled. "What, tired already? I thought you were having _fun."_ Thie was strangely happy to hear the mocking tone in his voice as he turned and tsked at his oldest son. "You can go if you apologize to the quarian first, Tol. And before you say it, you know the one."

Tollak whined. "But, Dad! He's just a suitrat, why do you _care-"_

"Hey, watch your manners." Everyone in the room flinched at the sharpness in his voice. "And apologize. Now, Tollak."

Tollak grumbled and cast a sideways glance at Thie, mandibles flaring in a disgusted sneer as he hissed, "Sorry for kicking your ass, buckethead."

Aephis crossed the room in seconds and cuffed Tollak upside the head. Axilus winced. "What did I just say?"

The smaller turian swore and backed away a step. "To apologize, and I did!"

"No, I said to watch your goddamn manners. Guess what you didn't do?"

"He's just a quarian, why do you _care?!"_

"Because he's Axilus's friend and that means he deserves the same amount of respect as anyone else." Aephis sounded like he was lecturing an infant. "Would you treat Freiya like that? What about Dantae? Demienn? No? That's what I thought. I don't _care_ if he's a quarian, you are _going_ to show him respect or I'll kick your ass so hard, it'll orbit Trebia." He crossed his arms and nodded towards Thie. "Now apologize. And this time, do it right, or I'll let your mother know she raised a vorcha instead of a good, honorable turian."

"You wouldn't."

"Bet me."

They glared hard at each other for a long moment. Then Tollak huffed loudly and mumbled, "Sorry."

"Spirits, Tollak, you act like you're whispering prayers to the spirit of Palaven themself instead of apologizing for a misdeed. How about you say that again, loud enough for the rest of us to hear?"

This time, he sounded like he was speaking through gritted teeth, which was quite an accomplishment for a species with mouths like the turians. "I said I'm-" he choked on the word for a moment, then threw a split-second glance at Thie and spat out, "-sorry."

Aephis relaxed and nodded. "Good boy." Then he cast a glance towards Thie. "How do you feel? A little better, I hope?"

Thie hesitated, nervously glancing from Aephis to Tollak and back again, then shrugged and quietly replied, "Sort of...? I mean, I don't feel like I'm going to throw up anymore, so, that's good...?"

"Yep, it sure is." Aephis trotted over and clapped a hand on Thie's shoulder, shaking him gently. "That's what I like to hear. C'mon, kid. The next round is all yours. Just me and you. How's that sound?"

He paled. "Um... what?"

"You heard me!" The turian sounded far too chipper for what the terrible fate he'd just bestowed upon the untrained, stick-thin quarian sitting in shock before him. Thie felt like he'd just watched himself be exiled. "Just you and me, kid. You look like you've got a little bit of training to you, and I'm sure you'll play a little better without a certain turian shooting you upside the head every chance he gets. Besides, I get the feeling there's something special about you and I wanna see it in play."

"I, uh, I don't- I don't think this is a good-" Thie stammered, but Aephis cut him off.

"Nonsense, of course it's a good idea! I had it, after all!" A hand twice the size of Thie's closed around his wrist and dragged him to his feet, and Thie had to fight the sudden urge to pass out cold. "C'mon, it won't be that bad. I'll take it easy on you, even!"

"No, I- I really don't- please, just let go-!" But no matter how hard he struggled, he just didn't have the strength to pull his hand away, and instead he watched in horror as Aephis dragged him out of the locker room and onto the battlefield, pushing his shotgun into his hands.

The arena VI didn't seem to care either, instead brightly droning, in the most ominous announcement Thie had ever heard in his life, _[Arena matchup: Major Aephis Madelivio versus Thie'Haasn nar Olyna. Round one. Begin.]_

Thie had just enough time to mutter, "Oh, _Keelah,"_ before all hell broke loose.

Aephis struck him immediately with an Overload, blowing his shields all to hell before he even got a chance to get into cover. Thie immediately dove behind a nearby crate, gasping for breath following the rather painful electrical shock, and fumbled with his omni-tool, eventually succeeding in pulling up the first ever iteration of his combat drone, a tinkling red-orange orb which happily hummed, "Good afternoon, master!" seconds before another Overload shattered its hologram to pieces.

Thie panicked.

He dove behind another crate, fumbling with his shotgun, and when he came up, Aephis was standing right in front of him, omni-tool glowing and a vicious grin on his face as he charged yet another Overload.

To say that he panicked again would be a grand understatement. It would be more adequate to say that at that moment, every cell in Thie's being spontaneously shat out about half of its lifespan, changed its mind about living, died, returned to life, and repeated the process once or twice in the span of about two seconds as his brain frantically raced for solutions to the problem that was the turian towering ominously in front of him. He swore he saw his life, short as it was, flash before his eyes as he fumbled around and raised the shotgun, desperately pointing it at least vaguely in his direction.

Aephis's omni-tool flashed and Thie yelped as his gun overheated all of a sudden, scorching his hands as the heat sink suddenly burst open and poured out a cloud of steam from nowhere. He had just enough time to recognize it as a Sabotage program before Aephis was suddenly upon him, one arm wrapping around his waist just like last time.

His mind blanked out.

By the time he came to again, he was several meters away from Aephis, who looked stunned, and the back of his neck buzzed like an enraged hornet's nest had been shoved whole under his skin. He glanced down, recognized that his skin was crawling with the wispy blue aura of biotics, and took a brief moment to thank whatever ancestor had cast their favor his way before calling up whatever energy he'd used before in desperate hope to replicate whatever it was he'd used.

His vision turned a vibrant blue and blurred and stretched and distorted and he felt a rush of wind against his suit, and then his vision returned to normal and he found himself successfully standing where he'd been before.

Right next to Aephis.

Who then grabbed him in a rather painful chokehold and flung him bodily over the nearest railing.

He came to again in the locker room, sprawled out on a bench with three pairs of eyes expectantly watching him and one set callously regarding him from across the room.

With a groan, he slowly sat up and winced, reaching his good arm back to rub delicately at the back of his neck. Now it felt less like a swarm of bees and more like a burning hot coal resting against his skin, which called up bad memories from the past. Definitely rattled it this time, he decided, definitely rattled it something awful, and he hadn't made it any better by using his biotics and whatever that charge thing had been. "What happened?" he managed to say after a minute, blinking blankly at Aephis.

Axilus spoke up before his father could. "You were dashing all over the place out there! That was so fuckin' cool, man, you looked awesome! But I thought your biotics were offline? Or, supposed to be, at least."

"I got a little freaked out and tossed you over a railing," Aephis interjected, looking as sheepish as a turian possibly could. Or maybe it was proud. Or something like that. Thie had no idea, he wasn't an expert on turian expressions. "Sorta forgot you were a biotic for a second, there. Still not used to that. You landed pretty hard, but there wasn't any damage. Just knocked you out cold for a few minutes. You feel all right? Thinking straight?"

Thie winced and pressed his fingers against the back of his neck again, the pressure soothing the ache somewhat, though he could feel the heat even through his gloves. It still felt like it was buzzing. Was it loose in its socket or something? Had that last headshot knocked it out of its setting? Maybe he should... No, no need to bring that up now. It would be fine, he just wouldn't use his biotics. Maybe later. They had enough to worry about. "Yeah, I think I'm all right. Mostly. Just a little foggy, but it'll wear off."

"Oh, good, no permanent damage." Aephis sounded pleasantly surprised, and Thie raised an eyebrow.

"I thought you said there was no damage?"

"We didn't think there was." He flicked one mandible out and dropped the other in a wry grin. "Good to know I was right!"

Thie just stared blankly at Aephis for a moment. Then he put his head back down on the bench and sighed. "I changed my mind. I'm just going to stay here for a while. Carry on with the next round, I'm sure you're excited to continue beating the shit out of each other."

"Yeah, we _want_ to continue." Axilus sounded disappointed, and when Thie spared him a glance, he had his arms crossed, mandibles fluttering a little in either frustration or anticipation. Couldn't really tell which, they looked a lot alike. "Thing is, Dad's dead set on the next match being me against you."

"Excuse me?"

"Yeah, that's what I said. You look like shit."

"Axilus!"

"What?" Axilus gestured wildly at Thie's prone form. " It's true! Look at him! He can hardly walk straight, he got shot in the head twice, just passed out from using his biotics, literally _just_ woke up, and you want him to fight _me?"_

"Well, yes." Aephis sounded offended, as if the very act of Axilus caring about Thie's safety before his father's orders was a direct attack on his honor. Which, who knew? Maybe in turian culture, it was. Thie didn't know. He wasn't a turian. "It'll be good to see how you two interact on the battlefield. You know each other, and being familiar with your opponent generally means you get better results because you know the other's tactics and have to work harder to counter them. It's a common military practice, son, don't question my logic."

"Okay, yeah, _military_ practice. Guess what I am?" Axilus gestured to himself and huffed. "I'm military. Yeah, okay, you win. You got that point. Good job. But _him?"_ He gestured to Thie, who blinked back in mild confusion. "He's _not._ He's a biotic engineer, Dad. Not a trained biotic, not a trained combat engineer, not even trained with how to use a damned gun. He's not military. You can't use military tactics on him cuz they don't work!"

"You think I managed to get promoted to major with no clue how to work with civilians? I think I know what I'm about, son."

"Dad, you're working them to death." Thie was surprised by the exasperation in Axilus's voice, and briefly questioned the strange surge of bubbly lightness in his chest before it flooded right back out. That was strange. "They're not turians," he'd continued, and Thie struggled to catch back up, "they're quarians. They're not meant for the sort of punishment we take on a daily basis."

"Son, if this kid could take what you said he took on that ship-"

"He didn't have a choice then!" Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Siri flinch and bury her head in her hands, quivering like a leaf. His own hands had begun shaking as the memories began to surface, and he struggled to push them back. "He was put in a bad situation, and he was damn lucky he made it out! The doctors still don't know how he didn't die! I don't know how he didn't die- Spirits, Dad, even my CO doesn't know! By all accounts, he shouldn't have made it! And you're trying to put him through that again, just because he went through it once!"

Aephis's voice was cool and level, and Thie found himself unnerved when he couldn't detect even a hint of emotion in it. Granted, his subvocals probably had everything he could have wanted to know, but, naturally, he couldn't hear those. "Remember that old human idiom, Axilus. 'What doesn't kill you makes you stronger.' If he did it once, he should be able to do it again."

"But Dad-!"

"Don't start, Axilus. You told me the potential you saw on that ship. If he really has it, he deserves to have it trained. If not, then we don't bother. End of story."

"Dad, just _listen-"_

"I'll do it."

Axilus froze and Aephis stiffened, both of them turning to look incredulously at Thie as he carefully swung his legs over the edge of the bench and slowly stood up, as he repeated, slowly and deliberately, "I'll do it." Then he considered for a moment and added, "Just this once."

"Thie, are you sure? What if you hurt yourself?"

"I didn't on the ship." He was careful to hold the memories at bay, refusing to let even the slightest tremor into his voice. If he just didn't let it surface, he'd be fine. "You're right. I should've died. But I didn't. Maybe I can do it again."

"Thie..."

He shook his head and carefully unholstered his shotgun, crossing the room to hand it to Kel, who had somehow obtained an ice pack sometime earlier and now held it against his injured wrist. Then he glanced back at Axilus and nodded. "Just this once. C'mon." He let the smallest smile twitch at the corners of his lips, even though Axilus couldn't see it. "Let's see what I can do."

* * *

Standing across from Axilus, the heatless lights beating down on him with such an intensity that he was forced to turn his visor's polarization nearly to its max, with no weapons, not even his omni-tool, Thie knew he should feel afraid. Or if not afraid, at least unnerved.

He wasn't a fighter. He was a mediocre engineer, a child on his Pilgrimage. Not a warrior.

And yet, somewhere deep in his chest, Thie was excited.

A sizeable crowd had gathered the moment the arena VI announced the upcoming biotics-only match, and even through the protective glass separating the battlefield from the spectators, Thie could hear whispers as the assembled crowd of turians, asari, and volus recognized his presence and its implications. He could hear their doubts, their chiding laughs as they jeered at the tryhard suitrat who claimed to be biotic standing opposite the son of one of Cipritine's greatest engineers and greatest soldiers.

His fingers tingled as his implant warmed, and his lips spread into an eager grin. How he looked forward to blowing away their doubts in one fantastic battle. Maybe even literally.

The VI broke the growing tension with its announcement at last.

_[Special match. Restrictions: biotics only. Arena matchup: Axilus Madelivio versus Thie'Haasn nar Olyna. Round one. Begin.]_

And Thie let go.

They met at the center of the battlefield, twin charges cancelling out and dispersing the shockwave into their surroundings, sending simulated crates and digital dirt flying in every direction. Thie brought up a glowing fist, slammed it into the dip just below Axilus's cowl, channelled everything he could into the resulting explosion and threw Axilus back a step. The turian reciprocated with a haphazard, hurried Throw, staggering Thie long enough to charge up enough to fling a Shockwave pulsing in his direction.

It took everything Thie had to dash away, and he stumbled once the charge ended, his implant buzzing angrily at the back of his skull. But it wasn't heating up yet, not yet, so he spun on his heel and threw out a hand, catching Axilus unprepared with a lightning-quick Warp that threw him into a nearby wall. Above him, the crowd roared.

But the turian was built to survive much worse, and peeled himself out of the Axilus-shaped indent left in the metal wall with yet another charge, though this one was badly-aimed and threw him nearly over the railing behind Thie. Thie spun to act, to hit him with something, _anything_ to throw him over, to claim the victory for his own, but he was too slow, and as he turned he glimpsed a pulsating aura around Axilus's skin and thought, _"Fuck."_

He threw his arms up to protect him, channeling everything he could into a dome-like barrier to protect himself from the biotic storm which erupted from Axilus like the shockwave of a CAIN. His implant burned. Sliced like a hot knife through his veins and flickered the aura radiating from his skin.

The barrier faltered. Failed. And the last thing Thie heard was the sickening  _crunch_ of his head against a metal wall.

And then everything was silent once more.

At least for a time. And then color and sound began to fade back into existence, and slowly, Thie became half-aware of hurried voices and hushed whispers as sharp hands poked and prodded and lifted him up only to put him back down. A faint prick at the inside of his elbow, his left emergency injection port. His helmet vanished, replaced by something cool which whispered air against his lips and gently tickled his nose. Then someone lifted him onto his side, rolled him over. Poked at the burning ember that was his implant, stirring it into a scalding fire, and he whimpered.

He could hear voices somewhere behind him, near and far. Near was unfamiliar, but definitely turian. He could hear the buzz of subvocals, taunting him just out of comprehension. Far was... someone. He knew that voice, somewhere. But he couldn't place it, not quite. A female.

No, not just one. A male, whom he also recognized. And someone else, two someones he didn't. An unknown male-ish voice was yelling. Or maybe just talking loudly. It hurt his head. Or, it probably would have, if he could feel anything. His body was numb. He couldn't even bring himself to worry about it.

He tried to pay attention for a few minutes, or maybe it was a few seconds. He couldn't tell. Time was relative when your head was swimming in an ocean of darkness just threatening to pull you back under. Then exhaustion won and he surrendered, letting his head slip back beneath the cloak of darkness, and all the sound and light went with it.

And as Thie slumbered on, blissfully unaware of his increasingly-negative situation, Aephis Madelivio meekly stood at his furious wife's side as karma, and his in-laws, finally caught up with him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well that was fun. I never claimed to be good at fight scenes.
> 
> The next chapter is entirely by the hand of my datemate, NoisyNoiverns, who's becoming much more of a cowriter now than a beta or idea fountain, because it centers entirely around their characters (the Madelivio family) instead of mine. That doesn't mean it's an extraneous chapter, though; it's just as canon as everything else in the fic, and it's a thousand times better than mine. Just something to look forward to, I guess.
> 
> See you next Friday!


	14. Mission Control, We've Had a Problem

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is entirely the work of my beloved datemate, NoisyNoiverns, with minimal input from me to keep the plot going. Next chapter, I take over once more, so I hope you enjoy!

Trierceo Actinus was nothing short of a giant. If his grandson was stupidly tall, he was monstrously so. The crowds parted before him, eager to avoid getting steamrolled in a single step. Nobody ever believed him when he said he was just an agricultural engineer, for some reason.

Which made it all the more terrifying when you factored in that he wasn't even the real threat, storming after his furious daughter towards Aephis, who looked like he considered geth space to be a _lovely_ vacation destination this time of year.

Normally, the sight of Trierceo was accompanied by yelling, almost always performed by him. This time, however, Sephira beat him to the punch. Literally. "What the _fuck_ were you _thinking!?"_ she roared, cuffing her husband upside the head. "I get a message from Tollak telling me you're being an ass, and I get not even _two steps inside_ to hear that _both parties_ were _incapped!?_ Aephis Madelivio, what do you have to say for yourself!?"

Aephis bowed his head, looking up from under the ridges of his brow plates. "I'm sorry?"

"You damn well _better_ be, Madelivio," she growled, folding her arms across her chest and lowering her mandibles in stern disapproval. "Now explain yourself."

Aephis glanced between Sephira and the looming figure of her father behind her, then swallowed. "W-well," he began, "see, the quarians didn't have any combat experience-"

"So you thought you'd just throw them into battle?" Sephira's mother interjected. Orian was short even for a turian, more than a head shorter than her daughter, but the ferocity of the disapproval on her face more than made up for it. "Aephis, I thought you knew better than that!"

"It seemed like a good idea at the time!"

"Oh, like the rocket launcher incident. Right." Sephira scowled. "They're not turians, Aephis! Hell, Tollak's on medical leave for _fatigue!_ The only one combat-ready was _Axilus,_ and he technically didn't even complete training!"

"Speaking of Ax..." Aephis started to say, trailing off once he noticed the twin expressions of disbelief on his in-laws' faces.

"Fatigue? Tol's on leave for _fatigue_ and you drag him to a combat sim anyway?" Trierceo asked incredulously before snorting. "I was wrong. You're even _dumber_ than I thought. Why you couldn't marry that Vardos boy, Sephira..."

"You hated him, too, Dad. Can you please stay on topic here?"

Aephis ran a hand along his crest and huffed. "Look, okay, I fucked up, I know. I'm an idiot who doesn't think anything through, I'm very sorry, and I'll accept any punishment you deem necessary, Seph. Like I said, _speaking of Ax_ , he and the quarian in blue passed the fuck out, the red one did something to his wrist, the tiny one wasn't doing so well last I saw her, and Tol's fucking exhausted, so we should get to medical and sort them out before you start killing me, yeah?"

Ignoring Trierceo's disbelieving, "What do you mean there's _more_ quarians? _"_ , Sephira ruffled her mandibles and sighed, putting a hand to her head. "Knowing you, 'did something to his wrist' could mean anything from a sprain to 'he no longer has one'. Which one is it?"

"Dunno. Hand's still attached, but he can't do much with it without screaming."

"And what about the blue one and my child? The one who's a few horns short of a crest."

"Well... Maybe you should see the footage first. It was really cool, actually, until they both got knocked out."

"Oh, fine," Sephira huffed, mandibles making tight little circles in irritation. "But then you are marching your sorry ass to medical with me and checking the damage your idiocy did."

The video replays were played in a small room off the main foyer, with not nearly enough screens to play the bout currently being obsessively repeated over and over again for all the bodies crammed in to try and simultaneously watch and gossip. Luckily- or unluckily, for Aephis- even the most crowded of rooms could make a little path for Trierceo, and he carved a trail for his shorter family, plus that Madelivio kid who kept hanging around his daughter. Orian apparently got tired of trying to make herself tall enough to see and climbed up the back of her husband, clinging to his cowl like a too-big nestling. The three green-marked turians stared, completely silent, with mandibles slack in disbelief as the white-blue of biotics raged across the screen. Aephis, meanwhile, just looked away, rubbing the back of his neck sheepishly, and waited for the inevitable.

They didn't keep him waiting long. Trierceo was the first to speak. _"That,"_ he said, pointing at Axilus, "shouldn't happen. And _that,"_ he switched to pointing at Thie, _"definitely_ shouldn't happen."

"Yeah, kinda surprised me, too," Aephis grumbled. "Seph, did you know?"

"Yes," she said absently, not noticing the matching incredulous looks it drew from her husband and parents. "Didn't think he was that strong, though. And Ax is going to need training. Look at how uncontrolled that last explosion is."

"Seph, we were talking about the fact that it happened _at all."_

"Oh, didn't I tell you?"

"We were a bit busy last night, dear."

"Oh, right." She shrugged. "Ax's CO said something about biotics being involved when she called. No details, because apparently that would kill her. Could've sworn I told you."

"No, dear, you really didn't. There was too much screaming and not enough calmly explaining, 'by the way, your son's a biotic, congratu-fucking-lations.'"

"Language, Aephis. There are small ones around." Sephira smirked, turning around and pushing a volus out of her way with her foot before weaving her way back out of the crowd. The other three followed, Aephis giving an apologetic look to the volus and the elder Actinuses quietly discussing exactly how a quarian could imitate biotics. "Come on. I need to make sure you didn't kill my boys. Or anyone else's."

The med-bay was comparatively quiet, with most of the activity centered in one corner. Sephira strode over to Tollak first, who'd hunched himself into a ball and was making the smallest little snoring sounds. "Tollak," she said gently, crouching by him and shaking his shoulder. "Tollak, sweetheart, wake up."

Tollak groaned, huddling in on himself a little tighter. "Five more minutes."

"Tol, Grandma and Grandpa are here. You don't want to sleep through them and let Ax get all the attention, do you?"

"Huh?" Tollak's head popped up, mandibles dropping momentarily in surprise before quirking upward in a smile when he recognized the adults now gathered around him. "Hi, Grandma." Trierceo grunted, and he added with a respectful little nod to him, "Hi, Grandpa."

Aephis snorted. "Sure, he's polite _now..."_

Sephira snapped her head around to give Aephis a sharp look. "What do you mean?"

Tollak's mandibles quickly drooped as his father relayed his earlier actions, then he ducked his head apologetically when Sephira glowered at him. "Sorry, Mom," he mumbled. "I won't do it again."

"Damn right you won't. You're _twenty-two years old_ , Tollak. This kind of behavior is beneath you. Aephis, did you ground him?"

Aephis nodded sharply. "Until the end of his leave."

"Good. Then, Tol, you're _super_ grounded." She huffed to herself, then heaved a sigh and leaned forward to awkwardly wrap her arms around her elder son and give him a gentle hug. "Are you okay? Any career-ending injuries?"

He shook his head. "No. I'm fine. You should check on the red quarian, though. He landed kinda hard."

"Duly noted. Any word on your brother?"

"No. Medics won't let anyone near him or the blue one. Must be a biotic thing. They barely spared a couple guys to help those other two quarians. Can we go home now?"

"No, dear, not yet. Be patient. Go back to sleep, if you want. I don't know how long this will take."

"Oh... Is Dad in trouble?" Tollak's mandibles fluttered in vague concern.

Sephira sighed. "Yes, Tollak, your father is very much in trouble. _You_ are also in trouble for being racist and disrespecting both your father and a superior officer in one fell swoop. And your _brother_ is in trouble for going along with it when all three of you should have known better. But we'll deal with that later, okay, little bird?"

Tollak was quiet for a moment, thinking, then nodded meekly. "Okay, Mom."

"Good. Glad we could sort that out." She patted his shoulder and stood up, stretching. "Go back to sleep, Tol. We'll wake you when it's time to leave."

As they walked away, Trierceo grumbled. "You're babying him, Sephira."

Sephira sighed. "Dad, please. I know how to deal with my own children. Neither of them respond well to anger. I've got this. Besides, you did the same damn thing right up until I went to basic and got a boyfriend. And before you ask, I didn't marry that one because I can guarantee you would have hated him even more than you hate Aephis."

"Impossible."

"Hey, you hate him less than you did when you met him. It's very possible for there to be someone I find attractive that you hate more."

"Could you two save this for later?" Orian interjected with a reproving click of her mandibles, speaking over Aephis' muttering about he was pretty sure Trierceo hated him even _more_ than in the past. "Trierceo, she's a grown woman with two children who have left home, you can leave her be about her romantic decisions. Sephira, I know you like antagonizing your father, but now's not the time."

"Mom, it is _always_ a good time for that."

"Sephira, you're grounded."

"Dad!"

"Listen to your father, Sephira."

"Mom!" Sephira spun on her heel to walk backwards and give her parents an exasperated look, then turned to Aephis. "Aephis, help me out here!"

"Sorry, darling, I have no power here."

"It can learn. Impressive." Trierceo snorted and increased the length of his strides, catching up to Sephira in a couple steps. "Turn around and watch where you're going, missy."

Sephira groaned and turned back around, muttering mutinously under her breath. By the time they reached the corner where Siri was curled up and Kel was nursing an arm wrapped up in a cast, she was still rubbing her head where Trierceo had cuffed her, scowling. "Okay, so what's wrong with you two?"

Kel didn't answer at first, busy staring up in wide-eyed terror at the monster of a turian looming behind Sephira, then shook his head quickly and refocused on Sephira. "I'm fine, except for my wrist, I think," he managed to get out. "The medic said I broke it, but it should be fine. Siri's kinda... I don't know. Shell-shocked?"

Sephira clicked her mandibles against her jaw and shot another glower towards Aephis, who rubbed his neck and looked away, thrumming an apologetic subvocal. Then she sighed and folded her arms. "Mom, Dad, Witless Wonder, could you go find somebody who'll tell us what happened to the other two while I talk to Siri? I think this many people might scare her. Take this kid with you."

Orian nodded, already reaching up to cover Trierceo and Aephis' mouths before they could protest. "Be nice, dear. I know it's not your strong point, but your father actually likes that one, so try not to scare her away."

Sephira huffed. "Mom, I do know how to be nice. I had to raise Tollak and Axilus, remember? Sweetest kids in the apartment building."

"I know of an entire school of boys your age who say different, but whatever you say, darling." Orian rolled her eyes and smiled before trotting off, Trierceo and Aephis in tow and Kel running after after a moment's hesitation.

Sephira grumbled under her breath, then moved to crouch next to Siri. "Siri'Yanna, are you okay?"

She cautiously laid a hand on Siri's shoulder, doing her best not to flinch when the girl jumped. "Hey, shh, it's alright. It's only me. You're in the medbay. Tol's napping and the rest went to check up on Axilus and the blue one. Nobody else here. You're safe."

Siri's tiny frame moved back and forth a few times as she took a couple deep breaths, then she sighed and looked up to meet Sephira's eyes. "I'm okay," she squeaked, voice shaking in a way that suggested she really wasn't. "Are we leaving?"

Sephira twitched a mandible, then remembered quarians couldn't read those very well and shook her head. "Ax and the blue quarian are still down for the count. Will you be okay if I let you sit by yourself so I can go check on them?"

Siri nodded so fast Sephira thought her head might come loose and fall off. "Yes, yes, I think so, I think I should just stay here and don't move, I'll be fine, really!"

Sephira raised a brow plate, then sighed and nodded. "Well, I'll be over there if you need me, okay? You know how tall my dad is, just look for him and you'll find me." She pushed herself to her feet with a small grunt, then folded her arms. "You sure you'll be alright?"

"Oh, yes, I'll be fine! You go check on your son, I'll be okay right here!"

Sephira stared at her for a moment, then sighed and nodded, turning to walk away. "We'll come get you when it's time to leave," she called over her shoulder, reaching up to adjust her headscarf as she walked.

A short ways away, the small group of her husband, her parents, and Kel was talking to a harried-looking asari in a medical uniform. "The turian will be fine," she was saying. "The explosion used up all the energy he had. Amp's fine, he didn't damage anything on his way to his very important date with the floor, and scans don't show anything bad. He's just exhausted. Let him sleep some more, get him some food, and he'll be back to normal in no time. The quarian, on the other hand..."

Sephira sighed, pushing her way past the others to look at the asari. "What's wrong with the quarian?"

The asari hesitated, furrowing her brow and putting a hand to her chin. "It's hard to say, really. We've never had to deal with a biotic quarian before, so we don't know what we should be looking at. But it's definitely something with his implant. It... malfunctioned. We're running some more scans now to try and see why and how." She gestured toward the cot in the corner with significantly less doctors around it, where a large heap of Axilus-colored plates was quietly dozing. "If you want to go check on him, I'll let you know as soon as we have more information. But please let him sleep, he's exhausted."

Sephira nodded. "Thank you, ma'am. We'll be here."

The asari nodded and walked away, and the group made their way over to where Axilus lay. Sephira's mandibles fluttered, and she ran a hand along her son's crest. "Poor kid," she murmured. "You see what you did, Aephis? Your son is passed out in the medbay because of your terrible decisions."

Aephis sighed and placed a hand on Sephira's shoulder. "I know, dear. And I feel terrible about it. But the doctor said he's fine. And knowing him, once he's back on his feet, you'll wish he'd stayed down longer."

"I had to deal with him for three months when he was eight and couldn't walk on a snapped shin plate, Aephis. I think I could deal with him complaining about some nasty bruises for a week or two."

Somewhere behind Mount Trierceo, Kel made an indistinguishable sound and sidestepped into view, eyes wide. "He's going to be okay, right?"

"Doctor said so, so most likely." Sephira shrugged. "Besides, you'd have better luck getting him to stay down if you bribed him with food. Or, you know, a broken leg. Which you are never, under any circumstances, to attempt. Damn kid woke me up every few hours screaming about how bad his leg hurt. It was like his infancy all over again."

Kel tilted his head. "I'm sure it wasn't that bad-"

"It was," said all four turians in unison before sharing amused looks (Trierceo's quickly shifted into disgust once he realized he'd had the same thought as Aephis). Then Orian added as an explanation, "The vast majority of turians break a plate or two by the time they go to basic. If they haven't, they break one there. It's like a rite of passage, except there's no special outcome. It just hurts. A lot."

Beneath Sephira's hand, Axilus was starting to stir, tilting his head to press against her hand. Looking around to see if any doctors could see to yell at her, Sephira noticed the asari doctor coming back and quickly leaned down to soothe and hush Axilus back to sleep while the other four turned to meet the asari.

The doctor raised a brow when everyone turned at once, then gave the tiniest of shrugs and looked down at a datapad. "Okay, I've got good news, bad news, and _really_ bad news. What do you want first?"

Orian glanced back at Sephira, who was still trying to keep Axilus asleep, then sighed and folded her arms, meeting the asari's eyes. "In that order, if you would."

The asari nodded. "Good news is, he'll live. That barrier he put up protected him from the brunt of the... armageddon, I guess. That's what the commentators are calling it. They're being over-dramatic, you ask me, but whatever. The quarian didn't have any physical injuries we can't fix in a minute or two, which we've already taken care of, so no issues there."

Orian sighed. "Good. What's the bad news?"

The asari made a face. "Bad news is, he's got the wrong implant. It's meant for asari, and he doesn't have nearly enough power for it, so it ends up overcompensating. And the really bad news is, all that overcompensation on the implant's part is cooking his brain. Another biotics display like that, he'll probably be dead."

"Is there anything we can do about it?" Sephira asked, seemingly materializing next to her mother, causing Orian to jump so high she could have come back down on Trierceo's hip spurs if she'd also moved backwards. Sephira gave her mother an apologetic look, then refocused on the asari.

The asari seemed a little startled by just how fast Sephira had moved, then shook it off and scrolled through her datapad. "That's another bit of good news, actually. His biotic signature seems about equivalent to a human's. With a little modification, a human L1 implant could be repurposed for a quarian and replace his current implant. Of course, it would have to be done as soon as possible. The longer that asari one stays in his skull, the better his chances of dying a horrific death involving fried brains. I know those are a delicacy for turians, but I think this one would be frowned upon."

Sephira blinked slowly, then sighed and put her head in her hand. "Would the L1 be a sufficient replacement?"

The asari shrugged. "By all calculations, it would severely reduce his biotic output, but that's better than slowly cooking yourself inside your own skull."

"She's got a point, Seph," Aephis said gently. "Think if it were Ax. Would you rather he be able to use his biotics, or stay alive?"

Sephira turned and looked at him for a long moment, then sighed. "Highest-paid engineer in my division, and this kid's going to demolish my bank account."

"We can pitch in," Orian offered, kicking Trierceo sharply when he made a "Say what now?" sort of sound. "It's not like we need the money. Retirement's still quite a ways off yet."

The asari nodded to herself and made a few notes on her datapad. "We've put him in a medically-induced coma to prevent him from using his biotics and hurting himself further, but we can bring him out of it long enough to get his permission for the surgery. Not doing so would be unethical, not to mention rude."

Sephira nodded sharply. "Do it, then."

The asari nodded and motioned for them to follow her. "Should take maybe ten minutes for him to come out of it. Might want to make yourselves comfortable."

It was more like eleven minutes and twenty-three seconds. Not that Sephira was counting. The drone was. Sephira was testing the programming she'd installed to see if Solas could learn to cheat while playing a versus game, and just happened to key in a command for a timer while calling it up. By the time Thie finally stirred, Tollak had gotten bored with trying to go back to his nap and drifted over, and Siri had calmed down enough to join the group of four turians plus Kel watching Sephira try to outsmart a cheating drone.

A muffled groan came from Thie's cot, and Sephira glanced up, drawing a quiet whine from Tollak, who was leaning on her shoulder. "Okay, Tol, I love you, but I need to get up and deal with the blue one. Go pretend you're not afraid of your grandfather."

"Mom, I don't think you understand how much I can't do that."

"Your sentence will be reduced by a week."

Tollak moved immediately, allowing Sephira to get to her feet and plod over to Thie's cot, folding her arms and twitching her mandibles slowly as she thought. "You awake, kid?"

Thie groaned, which sounded funny considering it was coming through a breather mask rather than the speaker on his suit. Sephira took that as an affirmative and continued, "Your implant's cooking your brain inside of your skull. If I was as incredibly racist as half the aliens I've ever worked with think I am instead of just very frustrated with people insisting on interrupting my work, I'd thank you for saving us the trouble, because brains take forever to cook all the way through. But since I'm not a fucking asshole, instead, we're going to try what the doctors suggested and replace your current implant with a human L1. Since it's a very invasive procedure, we're going to need your permission to continue."

Thie blinked slowly, eyes unfocused- or, they seemed unfocused. Sephira couldn't really tell without pupils to tell her where he was looking. Or maybe he was still processing the comment about how long it took to cook a brain. Funny how everyone forgot about the whole "turians are carnivorous by nature" thing. Maybe she shouldn't have said that while he was still waking up. Well, they'd find out if he had nightmares about turians coming for his brain.

After a moment- and a gentle prod from one of Sephira's talons- Thie let out a groggy little "Huh?"

Sephira sighed. "Do we have your permission to have you undergo surgery to switch your implant and save your damn life?"

"Oh..." Thie still seemed a little confused, but he at least sounded like he got it. "Okay, sure..."

Sephira nodded. "All we needed. You can go back to sleep now."

"Okay..."

She motioned over the asari and gave her the affirmative, then trotted back to the gaggle of turians and quarians now listening to Tollak tell stories from the past six years he'd been in the military. "Tell them about your girlfriend yet, Tol?"

Tollak jumped and cried, _"Mom!"_ at the same time Aephis and Trierceo asked, _"What_ girlfriend?"

Sephira fluttered her mandibles and gave an amused little trill. "You can tell them all about her later, Tol. We're going to have plenty of time. Blue's going to be transferred to Central for the surgery, and they'll send word along once it's over. Until then, we have pretty much the rest of the day free."

"Mother, I do not want to spend the rest of the day telling the most overprotective ba- _grandfather_ in the galaxy about my girlfriend."

"Nice catch, brat," Trierceo grumbled. "Thought you raised them better than that, Sephira."

"No comment," Sephira drawled. "Someone want to get Ax up? I don't want to leave him here."

"I'll get him," Tollak said, jumping to his feet and trotting over to Axilus' still-snoozing form. "Ax," he said, shaking his brother's shoulder.

There was no response. Tollak tried again. "Ax!"

Still no response. Tollak huffed, then flicked a mandible as an idea hit him. He leaned down and said, "Hey, Ax, lunch!"

A second passed, then Axilus sat up, glancing around. "Huh? Food?"

Sephira chuckled and walked over to him. "Not here, but we should go get some. You burned off breakfast with that blast. Come on, time to eat."

* * *

Sometimes, Sephira forgot how fast her father could talk when he was trying to convince her of something. And then he'd talk her into letting her parents pay for food, and she suddenly remembered. Trierceo and Orian insisted on paying for lunch, stating that it wasn't fair to Sephira and Aephis that they keep footing the bill on everything when they had more guests than expected, _and_ a pair of young turian boys could eat a _lot, especially_ when one was a biotic capable of unleashing a massive electric storm, even if it _did_ tucker him out completely.

The restaurant was a small little thing situated square in the middle of the path from the apartment to Cipritine Central Hospital, chosen just in case they needed to get to Thie in a timely manner. The turian at the front had started to say something presumably rather rude about the quarians. Then Trierceo had stepped inside, having to duck his head to get through the doorway, and that solved that problem. Sephira was secretly relieved. She'd already filled her quota for getting angry at strangers for the day, and going over it always left her so very tired. Being tired had its benefits, like nobody squabbling with her over the remote, blankets magically finding their way to lying on top of her, and a pillow the exact size, shape, and volume of Aephis, but it was too early in the day for being tired. Maybe later.

There was a rather pleasant air hanging about the place, something that just seemed to invite relaxation and conversation. Trierceo didn't even seem terribly crabby about having to be in close proximity to Aephis, and was actually managing to hold a civil conversation with him. Granted, it was a civil conversation about the best ways to deal with annoying coworkers, but it was better than nothing. Axilus and Tollak were trading off telling their mother and grandmother stories from the service, from Axilus' misadventures with insomnia to Tollak's perfect practice run in a training exercise. Kel and Siri didn't seem to know what to do with themselves in the midst of so many turians, and so were watching one of many vid screens hanging within view, this one playing a news feed.

They also didn't seem terribly happy about being stuck with the tubes of nutrient paste they'd pulled out of their pockets while the turians got their pick of the many dishes available on the menu (Axilus had been very disappointed to learn he couldn't just ask for two of everything). Oh, well. That was what the toggle for olfactory filters had been invented for.

Kel was just starting to wonder if maybe he should just start forcing down the paste now instead of waiting for the turians to get their food when a new report popped up on the news feed. The reporter was only a sentence and a half into their story when he turned to Axilus sitting next to him and shook his shoulder. "Look!" he said, pointing to the screen. "They're talking about the Spectres!"

The table hushed, everyone straining to hear every word as the reporter shared the information. Apparently, the humans were making a push to be included in the Spectres, and Saren Arterius would be evaluating the proposed candidate. With every word out of the reporter's mouth, Kel could feel the atmosphere of the table darken, until he wished he hadn't pointed it out at all.

The moment the story changed, Trierceo growled and shook his head quickly. "Ridiculous," he snorted. "Humans have only been here nine years, and they're already trying to shove their way into everything. Arrogant little bastards."

Aephis nodded sharply in agreement. "They could at least wait 'til they've got a stronger foothold in the galaxy. They're barely fledglings in the community."

Sephira flicked her mandibles hard. "Saren will sort it out," she said with finality. "If anyone can weed out a human, it's Saren."

Kel fidgeted. Don't say anything, Kel, he told himself. Just don't say anything. "I don't get it," he blurted out. "What's so bad about humans wanting a Spectre?" Dammit.

The turians went dead silent, then all of them turned slowly to look at Aephis and Sephira. The two looked at each other, then Aephis muttered, "You tell 'im," and glowered at the beer in his hand.

Sephira growled quietly and elbowed him, then huffed and turned to Kel. "We have something of a... personal connection to the Relay 314 Incident," she said rather stonily, mandibles twitching erratically with some emotion Kel couldn't fathom. "Aephis was severely injured at Shanxi, and his father's ship was almost destroyed. Everyone says it was just the family curse that kept them alive. And I..." She closed her eyes for a moment, taking a long, deep breath as Aephis wordlessly reached over and gripped her hand. When she continued, her voice shook. "I lost a very good, very old friend. He was the boys' honorary uncle. Couldn't visit often, but when he did, it was always something good. He was my best friend in the galaxy, and now he's dead. Because of the stupid. Fucking. _Humans."_

Aephis lifted Sephira's hand off the table just in time for it to clench sharp enough that it likely would have left deep gouges where her talons would have dug in had Aephis been a little bit slower. Watching her seethe, another question niggled at the back of Kel's mind- _but didn't the turians start it_ \- but he quickly decided that no, he _definitely_ wasn't going to ask that, because death was _really_ something he'd rather avoid, and this time he actually bit his own lip to keep the words from spilling out.

Luckily, it was at that point that the food arrived, saving him from any further mistakes. As Sephira slowly settled back down and ate, another thought occured to him, one he deemed definitely safe to ask. "Hey," he started, "does anyone know where the krogan went?"

The activity paused, and at the same time that Aephis and Sephira looked at each other and shrugged, Trierceo and Orian demanded incredulously, _"Krogan!?"_

Tollak grumbled. _"Finally,_ someone with the _proper_ reaction. Ax brought home krogan with the quarians. One of them _sings_." He shuddered.

Axilus looked up from his food, apparently too hungry to bother with utensils and just throwing everything back whole, then swallowed and asked, "Speaking of my friends, where's Thie?"

Silence descended again. Kel had to wonder if that was a regular occurrence for this family. Then Sephira sighed and rubbed at her brow plates with one hand. "Still with medical, Ax. Something with his implant. I'll explain later, okay? You need to eat."

Axilus' mandibles fell in surprise. "But Mom!" he protested.

"Don't you 'but Mom' me, young man," Sephira warned. "I told you I'd explain later. Eat."

Axilus fluttered his mandibles, a short growl escaping before he apparently remembered this was his mother he was talking to. "Mom, he's my _friend!_ The _least_ you can do is tell me if he's okay!"

"He's _fine,_ Axilus. Just eat!"

The two went quiet as Trierceo snarled, _"Quiet!"_ He jabbed a talon that to Kel looked disturbingly long at Axilus. _"You,_ respect your mother and eat your damn food. And _you,"_ he moved to point and glare at Sephira, then seemed to have second thoughts and waved a hand. "Actually, carry on. Smart decision. Axilus, your mother will explain later, once you're no longer acting like a child."

Sephira lifted her mandibles in a victorious smirk just as Axilus started to whine in protest. "But _Grandpa_!"

"No buts, young man. Eat and act your age."

"Grandpa, I'm sixteen!"

"And I'm ninety-four." Trierceo's eyes narrowed dangerously. "Don't. Argue."

Axilus huffed, then looked back down at his food and grumbled, "Sorry, sir."

"You're forgetting someone."

Axilus huffed again and glanced at Sephira. "Sorry, Mom."

"You'd better be, Axilus," Sephira warned. "You're a marine, not a nestling. Act like it."

Kel glanced between the turians, feeling like he'd just watched some important cultural lesson go flying over his head and sailing into Trebia. Well, nobody ever said turians were the most stable-minded of aliens...

* * *

It was approximately fuck-all-hundred at night when Sephira's omni-tool finally pinged with an alert and Solas cheerily told her that Thie was finally out of surgery. She snorted quietly to herself and gingerly removed Aephis' arm from across her waist. "Aephis, the kid's out of surgery."

Aephis grunted and turned his head to press it against the pillow. "Do I have to come?"

"Not if you don't want to, dear."

Aephis shifted to look at her, raising one brow plate. "Thought I was in trouble."

Sephira smiled. "I think you've redeemed yourself well enough. Go ahead and sleep."

"That was fast. You forgive the boys this easy?"

"Of course not. They're my children. You're my mate. There's a significant difference between those two terms."

"Oh, so it's husband privileges, then... Okay, then I'm going to bed. You're more energetic when you have to be quiet..."

Sephira fluttered her mandibles and scratched him affectionately behind the nearest mandible, drawing a soft purr from him. "Get some rest, love. I'll let you know what happened in the morning."

"'Kay. Try not to wake the kids when you get back."

"I know, dear. Go to sleep."

Aephis needed no further encouragement, and by the time Sephira had gotten her clothes back on and discouraged Solas from shocking her husband, he was snoring quietly into the pillow.

Sephira locked the door behind her, just in case anyone decided they needed her or Aephis' attention _immediately_ , and headed down the hall, careful to keep her steps as quiet as possible. She'd just head to the hospital, check in on the kid, and come back before anyone was the wiser.

Or maybe not.

Her mother was waiting for her in the living room, arms folded, the quarians standing nervously behind her. "You know, Sephi," Orian drawled, "stealth operations work a lot better when your partner in crime isn't a little ball of light buzzing _directly over my face."_

Sephira's mandibles dropped. Dammit. "Sorry, Mom," she grumbled. "Thought I programmed him to dim after sundown."

Orian's mandibles twitched in amusement. "You did. It just chose to move in a straight line from its spawn point at your terminal to the hall, which happened to be right over my face. I'm not Axilus, Sephira. That kid might be able to sleep through being fired out of an orbital cannon, once he manages to sleep anyway, but I can't." She shifted her weight to one leg, letting out a vaguely curious hum. "So, the quarians said their friend is out of surgery?"

Sephira blinked, then turned to look at Siri and Kel. "And how would you know about that?" Wait. "Did you hack my drone?"

Kel tilted his head, possibly in confusion, but also possibly in an attempt to look innocent, Sephira couldn't tell. But then Siri just sort of slowly withered. "I'm sorry!" she squeaked. "I only had the drone send alerts from the hospital to my omni-tool, I didn't fiddle with anything that seemed important!"

Sephira puffed up. "Do you know how much of that drone is illegal? All of it is important, he's mine! How did you even get through my security protocols? I've been refining it since I was in mandatory! That's the most advanced VI this side of the Widow relay!"

"Sephira," Orian warned, casting a concerned glance in Siri's direction.

Sephira shook for a moment, then forced out an exhale, deflating rapidly and reaching up to smooth a hand over her fringe. "Right, right, sure, okay, I'm calm." She took another couple of deep breaths, then nodded to herself. "I can understand why you did it. Just- don't touch my drone, okay? He's important to me, and I don't want anybody but me meddling with his code."

Siri nodded faintly, then tipped over backwards onto the couch. Kel looked between them, then darted over to check on her as Sephira shook out her neck and folded her arms. "Right, okay. Yes, Mom, the one quarian is out of the hospital. I'm just going to go check on him, make sure he's alright, then I'm going to come straight back and go to bed, because it's kind of hard to find the motivation to stay with a quarian kid very long when I haven't slept next to my husband in two weeks. You can go back to sleep, I'll be fine, and I'll fill everyone in in the morning."

Orian considered, then shrugged. "Fine. But I'm coming with you."

"What? Mom, that's really not-"

"Sephira, that kid just went through an incredibly dangerous surgery. I'm not saying we have to wake up everyone to go greet him, but he could stand to have more than just you around when he comes to. You're not exactly the friendliest of sorts."

Sephira huffed. "Ax and Tol turned out just fine."

"They're Madelivios, dear. This is a quarian, not a skinny krogan in turian plating."

Kel, apparently satisfied Siri hadn't just prematurely expired, hopped up. "I'm coming, too," he said, wringing his good wrist and looking between the two women. "I mean, he's my best friend, and I want to make sure he's okay."

"Perfectly understandable," Orian acquiesced, giving Sephira a look that dared her to argue. "Let me leave a note for your father, and we can leave."

"But Mom-!" Sephira groaned in exasperation, reaching up to pinch her nose. "Fine. But can we _please_ hurry? I want to go to sleep with an Aephis-shaped blanket."

"He's not going anywhere, dear. I can hear him snoring from here."

"It's the principle of the thing, Mom."

"Sephira, you stink of him. Be happy the drone woke me instead of your father, or you'd be getting a five-hour lecture instead of a one-hour trip to the hospital."

"Mom, please."

"So, um," Kel hedged, "are we going to leave soon, or are we going to sit here arguing until the sun comes up?"

Sephira gave him a patented Sephira Actinus Withering Glare™, then sighed and nodded. "S'pose I can't convince either of you to stay. Might as well go now, before Dad wakes up. I'm too tired to listen to him rant about my choice in mates."

It was late enough at night that the other pedestrians out and about were few and far between. There was one volus who spotted Sephira and immediately decided the other side of the street was a much better place to walk, prompting Orian to briefly scold her daughter on how she thought she'd taught her to stop tormenting the poor untasty morsels. Judging by Kel's body language after that statement, Sephira was pretty sure the quarian was very afraid to be anywhere near turians. What a darn shame it was that he was on their homeworld. Sucked to be him.

Cipritine Central Hospital had that eerie air of a busy place that was no longer busy, with a solitary nurse on call at the front desk. He glanced up when he heard the doors open, then spread his mandibles in a lopsided grin. "Sephira," he greeted cordially. "Strange to see you this time of day. If you're looking for Corinn, you just missed her. She went home fifteen minutes ago."

Sephira flicked a mandible out and folded her arms, resting her weight on one leg and nodding to him. "Herlius. Good to see you. I'm visiting someone tonight, actually."

The nurse raised a brow plate. "Sephira Actinus, visiting a victim? Be still my beating heart. You must be going soft."

Sephira chuckled, ignoring the heated glare her mother shot her way at the word "victim." "No, I didn't put him there, this time. The quarian who just came out of surgery a short while ago."

The other brow plate shot up to meet the first. "The biotic? Figures. Of all the turians for a biotic quarian to latch onto, of course he'd pick the TEC Terror. One moment." He glanced down at his terminal and tapped a few keys, then nodded and looked back up. "Room 3471. Elevator's down the hall to your right. Third floor, go straight out from the elevator, hang a left, go straight for two halls, then a right, and it's the first door on your left."

Sephira nodded. "Thanks, Li. We'll be back out in an hour or two. If you see Veltus, punch him for me."

"Got it. See you around, Seph _."_

Sephira waved a hand as she headed down the hall to the elevator, Orian and Kel trotting after her after a moment. The party was silent right up until the doors closed and the elevator started to move, then Orian turned on her daughter with a scowl. "Sephira, does he know you're married?"

Sephira sighed. "Mom, he knows I'm not interested. _I_ know he's not interested. Sure, he's hot, but he's also married. And contrary to what Dad would have you believe, so am I. We're just friends."

"Who bond over your beating people up. Which is _also_ not okay, young lady."

Sephira groaned. "Mom, can we please not discuss this now? We're almost there, I just got laid, and I'd like to hold onto that post-coitus high for as long as possible before I have to go home and probably listen to Dad complain. I'd also like to not be in a bad mood while talking to a drowsy quarian, but that's secondary."

Orian fixed her with a glower that clearly said they weren't done talking about this right as the elevator doors opened with a pleasant _ding._ Kel was the first one off, apparently eager to get away from the squabbling plated birds of death and carnivorism. Sephira took the lead again, and it was a very silent walk to Thie's room, the only sound being their respective footsteps on the tile.

There was a doctor waiting for them in Thie's room, busy shining a light into the quarian's eyes and making notes on a datapad. He glanced up when they entered, then nodded respectfully and backed away, motioning for them to go ahead. Kel darted over to Thie's side, taking his hand in his non-injured one. "Thie! Are you alright?"

Thie made a quiet little groaning sound. "I feel like an elcor sat on my head..."

The doctor tried to muffle a laugh and only partially succeeded. "He's still coming off the effects of the anaesthesia. Be patient with him."

Thie rolled his head over slowly to look at the turian women, squinting slightly at Orian. "Where... where'd your crest go..?"

Orian blinked, then raised a brow plate. "Mistaken for my grandson. There's a new one. And Tol's a few shades lighter than me, too."

"Mom, he's still waking up. And you wanted _me_ to be nice..."

"Sephira, I became a botanist so I could work with plants, not people. Plants don't care if you're nice or not."

Sephira rolled her eyes before making her way over to Thie's side and looking at the doctor. "How'd it go?"

The doctor bobbed his head respectfully and picked up his datapad, scrolling back to the top. "Surprisingly well, all things considered. No signs of brain damage, and the L1 was integrated into his system with minimal reaction. He should be back on his feet in about a week or so, and can be discharged earlier than that if need be, though I'd prefer he stay here where we can keep an eye on him. We also did a bit of meddling with that leg of his while we were in the OR anyway, and that should heal right up within the month. We replaced the boot with a new cast, since putting weight on the damn thing was just making it worse, so I'm going to have to strongly recommend he stay on crutches until a medical professional gives him the OK."

Kel muttered, "Oh, he's not going to like that..."

"And, since you're here," the doctor continued like Kel hadn't spoken, "there's something you should take a look at." He scrolled down the datapad's display and turned it around so the rest could see the picture on-screen. "I took some pictures of the implant we removed. Notice anything?"

Sephira leaned in and squinted, then her mandibles flared out. "Oh."

"Exactly."

"Huh?" Kel asked, tilting his head to one side. "I don't get it. What's wrong with it?"

Sephira leaned back, folding her arms across her chest. "No serial number."

"Uh... what does that mean?"

"It means there's no serial number, dingus." Sephira rolled her eyes. "Black market giveaway. Kid got the thing from someone he shouldn't've. Probably a cheap copy of a copy. If you're going to shop on the black market, you need to look for something with a serial number. More expensive, but it's less likely to be dangerous."

"And how do you know that, young lady?" Orian lowered her mandibles disapprovingly.

"You'd be amazed." Sephira flicked a mandible dismissively, then rounded on Thie, hands on her hips. "Now why the _hell_ would you think that a _black market implant_ was a good idea?"

Thie blinked slowly, then just said a rather nervous, "Um."

"Oh, hello there, Siri'Yanna, I didn't realize you and this idiot switched places," Sephira snapped. "Let's hear you try to justify this, kid. And don't give me the 'I didn't know' routine, I didn't take it from my boys, and I'm not going to take it from you."

Thie took a few slow inhales from the breather mask, looking for all the world like he wished his mask was back between him and the angry turian mother currently glaring daggers into his soul. "It was... cheap..."

"So you figured a shitty, shady-as-fuck knockoff would be better than just going without until you could afford better? Shit, and I thought the rocket launcher incident was a crowning moment of stupid for this galaxy."

Orian coughed. "Are you ever going to explain that, dear?"

"Not the time, Mom. Also, no."

Thie looked like he wanted to cry. "Implants are really expensive... It would've taken ages of indentured servitude to afford just an L1..."

"Well, happy _fucking_ birthday, you get one for free, you leech. I'm going to start charging you for all the shit I'm paying for. Today was my last damn free day of the ones I took off for Tol's medical leave, so _congratu-fucking-lations_ , now you get to talk to doctors until the weekend. You know how long a Palaven week is? Ten damn days, and we aren't even halfway through. Have fucking fun. It's way too late at night for this."

Thie made a feeble sound of protest, eyes wide. "Wait- what?" Apparently surprise took away anaesthesia-induced exhaustion, who knew. "What about my implant?"

Sephira snorted contemptously. "The black market shitfest you got was cooking your brain inside your skull. This late in the day, I'm tempted to say I'd've eaten it for you, lessen the bio-waste. Instead, you just came out of surgery to get fitted with an L1."

Thie frowned slightly, and the doctor cut in, "We have it disabled for the time being. You don't have enough energy to be manipulating a _kori_ -spine headdress, much less dark energy."

"A what?"

"Traditional stuff. Explain later. Go the _fuck_ to sleep," Sephira growled.

"But-"

The doctor hummed, tapping a few buttons on his omni-tool. "She's right. You shouldn't be awake at the moment, anyway. Give your system more time to recover. Say good-night."

The sedatives hit before Thie could get a word in edgewise, and down he went.

Sephira groaned. "Fuckin' _finally,"_ she griped. "Now, I don't care what anyone else does at this point, but I'm going to go home, tell my husband I love him, and _go to sleep_ , like I _should_ be."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's a collection of drabbles that'll be going up later today. All of them will be canon, but none are required reading, and the collection will be updated throughout the next week or so.


	15. The Only Thing Worse Than Saying Goodbye is Saying It Twice

Thie had never been one to count the days.

In space, time meant nothing but a blinking number off in the corner of your heads-up display telling you that you'd been up for three more shifts than you should have been. It was relative to the task at hand. You worked when you awoke and slept when you were tired, with no real rhythm. With no sun around to tell you when night was, everyone fell into their own habits and measured in shifts rather than hours, cycles rather than days. It was easy to get into a job, do something you liked, and forget time existed until you resurfaced and realized a week had passed by unnoticed.

On Palaven, however, days meant the time between one sunrise and the next. The sun came up and everyone woke up, got up, and bustled around the city of Cipritine like energetic ants. The sun went down and everyone went home, got in bed, and went to sleep. Everyone shared the same clock, the same pattern, the same time. A "week" became a set of ten sunrises, a "month" fifty-three.

After years of living shifts and cycles, converting to hours was a daunting task. Thie quickly found it easier to simply rely on sunrises, however unreliable they would be once the seasons began to change. For the moment, it served its purpose, and he began to measure the passing days.

And Thie learned very, very quickly that ten sunrises took forever to pass, especially when you were lying in a turian hospital with absolutely nothing to do for approximately all of them.

And then, once he hobbled out on ill-fitting crutches and a cinderblock cast, he learned just how incredibly long forty-three sunrises were, and how intimidating it was to live in a turian apartment for every single one of them. He hadn't known he could feel such a wave of relief once the day arrived for the cast to come off of both his leg and arm and Kel's wrist, the day they could finally, _finally_ leave the turian homeworld and get back to their Pilgrimages.

Sephira Actinus, top engineer in her division at TEC, dragged Thie and Axilus to the store a day later, after Axilus made it very clear that he wanted to leave Palaven with the quarians, and proceeded to spend more money than Thie imagined he'd ever be able to make in his life on quality supplies for them.

"I'm one of Palaven's best engineers," she snapped when Thie began to question the growing sum, "I think I can afford to spend a little money to make sure my son and his friends aren't eating that bullshit the Migrant Fleet and turian training corps tells you is food."

Thie wisely chose not to argue, instead staring wide-eyed at the crates of supplies and quietly wondering how in the world they were going to fit everything into their tiny footlocker of a ship when it didn't even have a proper cargo bay.

That didn't turn out to be an issue, because the moment Sephira caught sight of the _August Meridian_ , she laughed once, then turned on her heel and said, "No fuckin' way are you flying off in _that_ scrap heap."

Axilus was the one to protest this time, when she dragged them to a secondhand ship store and settled on a small (but definitely larger than the _August Meridian_ , thank the ancestors) turian freighter with the name _Regalus_ emblazoned in standard turian type on its starboard side. The price tag was enough to make Thie want to pass out, but Sephira didn't even flinch. He had to wonder if money simply lost all meaning when you had so much of it. Maybe that was why rich people liked buying senseless frivolities. He was about to ask when Axilus sputtered and began to argue.

His eyes were wide and his mandibles quivering, a panicked trill in his subvocals. "Mom, ships are expensive, you really don't have to-!"

And Sephira cut him off immediately with a glare and said, quite simply, "I'm not losing you, too."

Axilus shut up immediately, processing the statement for just a moment before hanging his head and mumbling, "Sorry, Mom," as she tossed a credit chit at the retailer and marched towards the ship's airlock, Thie and Ax sharing a look before trudging along after her.

The krogan showed up while they were transferring cargo, each of them quietly taking crates larger than Thie himself and hauling them into the rather spacious cargo bay with all the ease of a volus balancing stocks. Then arrived Kel, his arm still hanging in a sling by doctor's orders though the cast had been removed, and Siri, who still looked nervous but not nearly so much as she had been a month before, and they both lent their assistance as well as they possibly could despite one of them being somewhat crippled and the other far too puny, physically, to do much at all.

Aephis arrived much later, after everything had been squared away, his mandibles hanging low and loose as he clasped forearms with Axilus and gently touched their foreheads together. "Be safe out there, son," he said in the gentlest voice Thie had ever heard from a turian, but especially from one of his size. "You need anything, just give me a call."

"I know." Axilus fluttered his mandibles slightly and leaned back, beaming at his father. "Don't worry about me. I'm a Madelivio, remember?"

"That's _exactly_ what worries me." Aephis cocked his mandibles in a smile and tapped Axilus's forehead. "Don't go jumping in front of any rockets, that's my thing and your mother would kill you. No orbital strikes or thresher maws, either."

"Aw, but that takes all the fun out of being a young, stupid Madelivio kid!" A small burst of turian laughter, and then Axilus nuzzled his father's forehead in what Thie presumed to be some sort of affectionate familial gesture. "Don't worry, Dad, I'll be good. No rockets, no orbital strikes, no thresher maws..." He flicked out a mandible in a wry grin and added, "And no CAINs. Don't worry, I'm not _that_ dumb."

"Don't let your grandfather hear you say that." Aephis's grip on Axilus's forearm tightened for a moment. Then he slowly, reluctantly let go, nudging him in Sephira's direction. "Go say goodbye to your mother."

And then, as Axilus moved to oblige, Aephis rounded on Thie, Kel, and Siri, looking utterly exhausted. He still drew himself up tall once he arrived, folding his arms behind his back in the typical soldier posture every turian seemed to have hammered into their brains since birth. "Take care of my son," he ordered despite his tiredness. "Keep him safe. If he gets hurt..."

"We know," Kel replied, nodding shortly. Then he dipped into an awkward sort of half-bow and said, "Thank you for everything. We couldn't have asked for better."

"Damn good you didn't, you've already wiped out our savings as it is." Aephis flicked out a mandible in a wry grin and chuckled slightly, then sighed, placing a hand on Thie's shoulder. "You be careful, too. Ax cares about you, you know. Even I can tell, and I'm generally pretty blind to the mushy stuff. Take good care of him."

Thie struggled to find his voice, managing to swallow hard and nod. "I know. I will."

Aephis nodded slowly, then removed his hand and nodded to Siri. "You too, Siri'Yanna. Be safe out there. The galaxy is a terrible place for someone as soft as you. Don't let it get to you."

Siri fidgeted and nodded slowly. "I know. I'll, um, I'll try."

"I mean it." He gave her a long, hard look. "There will be people out there who will try to take advantage of you, both because you're a quarian and because you're so shy. Especially because you're a quarian, in most parts of the galaxy. Don't let them. If you have to, let your gun do the talking." He paused, then shrugged and motioned towards the two krogan ambling about around the _Regalus._ "Or the krogan. I'm sure they'd be happy to keep a little girl like you safe."

Even through her mask, Thie could tell she blushed, because she always did. "I, um, okay... I'll do my best, I promise." She ducked her head. "Thank you..."

And then Sephira drifted over, Axilus in tow, with a mildly surprised expression on her face. "Siri'Yanna, you're leaving, too?"

For a moment, Thie was surprised that Sephira was surprised. Then he remembered the story about how Siri had been working with her for months now, keeping her quiet company during the day and curling up in a corner at their apartment during the night, and realized that she'd probably become quite accustomed to the girl's omnipresence in her life. She'd become an almost permanent fixture since she'd crash-landed in Cipritine. No wonder Sephira be surprised, especially considering Siri's shyness. Probably never expected her to leave, not without force or some serious convincing.

Siri looked down, wringing her hands anxiously. "I, um, I thought, well, uh... Y-you didn't really want me around anymore, 'cause I'm sort of... in the way, so I thought- I thought, since I need to get back to my Pilgrimage anyway, I might as well go with... Thie'Haasn and Kel'Raanis..." She trailed off, trying to slow her breathing down again. She'd been getting better at controlling her anxiety, at learning to handle the panic, but it was a long, hard process, and she still had a long way to go.

Sephira blinked, mandibles twitching in what Thie thought for a brief moment might be distress. Then Aephis gently took her hand, making that buzzing sound he'd come to associate with subvocals-only communication, and she took a deep breath and nodded. "Right. Suppose you might as well." She shook out her neck and regarded Siri carefully for a moment, then put a hand on her shoulder and crouched down until she was on eye level with the much smaller quarian. "You take care of yourself, alright? This isn't like sending my idiot kids off to basic. You've got a much more dangerous time ahead of you, but you can do it, yeah? Just... be careful. You're a good kid, and a damn good engineer. Galaxy'd be a little bit less without you."

She straightened up suddenly, withdrawing to stand huddled under Aephis' arm. If turians could, Thie would have thought she was about to cry.

Siri hunched in on herself, and Kel quickly put an arm around her as her shoulders started shaking and, even though she'd cut off her external speaker, very clearly began to cry. Leaving Kel to comfort her, Thie addressed Sephira with a nod. "Don't worry, Mistress. We'll take care of her. I promise she won't be harmed."

Then, seeing as he was pretty sure everyone was about to break down into tears, himself included, Thie turned and motioned for Kel to steer Siri towards their new ship, and for Axilus to follow. Axilus lingered for a moment, gently touching his forehead to his mother's, then hurried after them, mandibles quivering erratically.

He managed to wait until they were onboard, then leaned against the sealed airlock and pressed a hand against his visor, inhaling and exhaling slowly. Axilus mutely took the cockpit, tapping almost mechanically at the controls to bring the ship's critical systems online. "All green," he all but whispered, voice cracking slightly. "We're clear to leave."

When Thie couldn't answer, Raik did instead. "Disengage the docking clamps and take it real easy," he directed. "This is a little port, not the Citadel. And this ship's bigger than the bucket of bolts we had before."

"I know how to fly a ship, Gemeng."

"Told you to call me Raik."

"Whatever. Just... go away. I can do this myself."

"You sure?"

"I just... I just need some time."

Raik 'hmph'ed and shook his head. "Set course for the Citadel. Better chance of finding something to do once we get there." Then he turned, pulled Thie to his feet, and very carefully escorted him to the stairs.

The second deck was much larger than on the _August Meridian_ , containing a decent-sized kitchen, a small multipurpose bay claimed by Crux, a cramped crew quarters serving as Kel's home, and another set of stairs leading to Engineering, where Siri had apparently decided to set up shop. Raik gently nudged Thie into what was supposed to be the CO's quarters, then trudged his way into the bay after giving the cargo bay a contemplative look. Not enough room there. He'd just see if Blue felt like sharing.

The bay had a large window looking out from the _Regalus_ 's port side into the vast nothingness of space, an odd choice for what was basically just a big empty room. Raik moved to stand beside Crux at the window, watching Palaven fall away below them. "So," he said, "nice ship."

"Better than that insult to engineering we had before," Crux answered with a wide grin. "Look at this, we have room to move! Shame I didn't bring a few dummies or we could practice some moves in here. Oh, wait." He grinned in Raik's direction.

Raik rolled his eyes and ignored the playful jab. "How are Girlie and Blabbermouth doing?"

The smile disappeared. "I don't think Siri's doing too well. Hasn't stopped crying. Dunno if she _can._ Kinda worried she might drown in her helmet. But Red Riding Hood over there is fine. What about Little Boy Blue?"

"Shell-shocked, I think. I don't think he's good at being around other people and their emotions."

"So, like Siri."

Raik made an affirmative grunting noise. "Except without the anxiety."

"And what about Birdbrain up there? You sure he's okay to be flying the ship?"

"Have you ever seen a turian pilot before, Gurdnau?"

"Nope. Try to stay away from 'em before they decide they want to know what krogan tastes like."

"Turian pilots focus entirely on their mission. 100%. We have nothing to worry about with him in the cockpit." He shrugged. "If it was still Raanis, I could see being worried. But Mads? Nah. He could fly us through a gas giant without a scratch."

"You think?"

Raik paused. "... You know what, let's just hope that never happens."

* * *

A few hours later, once everything settled down and moods evened out, everyone had convened in the upper deck for quite possibly the most juvenile pastime in the galaxy.

Storytime.

"-so I pulled back hard on the throttle, but, you know, nothing helps when the main engine decides it wants to stop working," Siri was saying, the other quarians enraptured in her tale, "and I'm _this close_ to hitting the edge of Cipritine, right? So I pulled all the power I could out of the auxiliary systems and gunned the starboard thrusters as hard as I could, hoping I could at _least_ land in the ocean a couple kilometers that way. But no, apparently the ancestors hated me, because I hit this tiny little farmhouse in the middle of nowhere. Didn't hurt anyone, the place was abandoned for _years_ before, and I landed in what used to be the barn. Right through the roof, landed in a pile of scratchy stuff that took ages to get out of the seals."

From the cockpit, Axilus, who had been listening in the entire time, hollered back, _"Surbrola,_ is what you're talking about."

"Thank you," Siri called back before resuming her story. "Anyway, so I crawled out of the barn and my ship, well, it didn't look like a ship anymore. Neither did the house. Like a house, I mean, not a ship. No broken bones, surprisingly, but one of my air hoses got slashed in the fall and was leaking contaminated air into my oxygen filter. Three days later, I limped into one of Cipritine's engineering bases, exhausted and delirious with fever, and the next thing I knew, I was being nursed back to health by the tallest, most intimidating asari in the galaxy. So I figured I owed them for saving my life, and, well..." The energetic high drained away and she shyly toyed with her belts. "I ended up at Mistress Actinus's division when no one else wanted me. I thought she was going to turn me away, too, but then she stopped yelling and threatening to throw me in the drive core prototype she was working on and just looked at me... and then she just went back to work and told me to be quiet." She shrugged. "So I was. And then she took me home when she figured out I was sleeping in the air vents..."

Raik raised an eye ridge. "How the hell did you survive a fall from orbit?"

Siri shrugged again. "I really don't know. Pure luck, I guess."

Kel whistled. "Wow. That sounds more exciting than my entire life. I mean, I can't say I'm jealous about the crashing ship part, but I'm jealous you got to have so much happen. Guess that means the rest of life ought to be smooth flying, right?"

"I hope so." She shook her head. "I never want to go through anything like that again."

"What are you thinking about doing for your Pilgrimage?"

She paused, then lowered her head and raised one shoulder in an awkward shrug. "I don't know. I haven't really thought about it. Maybe get a new ship and take it home? Or something with the geth, maybe... I don't know."

"If it's the geth you want, the Citadel will be a good place to begin," Thie interjected, leaning back against the wall and crossing his arms. "I mean, it's a pretty major communications hub. If we're going to find anything about the geth, it'll be there. We can do a little bit of surveillance, see if anyone gets any information about geth movements, and get there before they do. See what we can pull on them." He shrugged. "Maybe we can try to get an intact memory core. No one's ever managed to do it before. Maybe we can be the first. We'd be free to join whatever ship we wanted if we could pull that off."

"Yeah, but the geth haven't been outside the Veil since they kicked us off Rannoch," Kel argued. "What makes you think they're going to leave the safety of geth space now?"

Thie paused, then just shrugged. "A hunch."

Siri fidgeted. "Well, we can try. I mean, we might not find anything, or we might find something huge. Isn't it worth a shot?"

Kel huffed and shook his head. "Fine, but don't say I didn't warn you."

Siri paused for a moment, then looked up at Thie. "I'm... sorry to change the subject, but didn't you say you were biotic?"

"Huh? Oh, yeah." Thie held a hand flickering with blue out in front of him, frowning. The L1 hadn't exactly been kind to his biotic output, and now even levitating a datapad for half a second was more difficult than doing advanced astrophysics with a blindfold. He was greatly irritated, but, well, at least he wasn't dead. "Not so much anymore, but yeah."

"How did that happen? I didn't think we could _have_ biotics..." She trailed off, eyes widening as her anxiety caught up with her. "I'm sorry, that was a dumb question-"

Thie shook his head. "No, no, it's fine. But to be honest, even I don't really know."

"His mom, Atris'Mora vas Olyna, she had a compromised respiratory recycling system and didn't know it," Kel volunteered, "and she worked with the drive cores while she was pregnant. A few weeks of accidentally breathing dust-form eezo later..." He shrugged. "She got deathly sick and Thie got biotics." He glanced over at Thie and shrugged a little. "Sorry, my dad worked with her during their Pilgrimages. Stayed in contact afterwards. Good friends, according to him. Told me all about how it happened after I was old enough to ask."

Siri was quiet for a moment. "... did she die?"

Thie sighed, wishing he could rub his temples. "Yeah. And then my dad got addicted to red sand, my brother decided to join the marines to get away from it all, and everything went to shit. Welcome to the story of my life. The summary? 'Everything is shit.' Great story, isn't it?"

"I didn't know quarians could get hold of red sand," Crux grumbled, frowning. "You'd think someone would notice."

"That's what smugglers are for. Besides, it's not like I grew up on a liveship. They didn't regulate everything that came in."

Thie was about to continue, but Raik cut him off. "How about a good, happy story before everyone gets depressed? I think I prefer diabetes over depression, anyone else?"

"What story are you planning on telling us this time?" To his credit, Thie didn't sound as offended as Kel figured he would, for having been cut off unceremoniously from telling his rather-depressing life story. In fact, while he sounded exasperated, he also sounded sort of excited. Which wa a good thing, because Thie never got excited.

Raik grinned. "So this one time, I was heading home to Tuchanka after a stint out as a merc. Got tired, figured, 'hey, I haven't fed Fluffy in a while', went back home, and dragged a bunch of varren out to where I keep 'im."

"Wait, Fluffy?"

"Thresher maw. Just wait."

"A thresher maw named Fluffy." Axilus twisted around in his seat to deliver a deadpan stare, then shook his head and sat back. "Yep, I've heard it all, and I'm only sixteen."

"Heh. So anyway, I'm draggin' these varren out to Fluffy's pen, and I realize, 'holy shit, he's going nuts out there, must've grabbed some poor bastard and started fuckin' with his food'. I tried to teach him not to, but thresher maws don't listen for shit. So I drop the varren and get in closer and I realize Fluffy's not messing with some poor sod of a krogan that got horribly lost. No, he's got a turian hanging from one of his spines, screaming his fool head off as Fluffy tosses around and tries to buck him off. I watch for a few, cuz this is fuckin' hilarious, and then Fluffy gets a good throw in and the turian goes sailing off into a pile of rubble some three klicks that way. So I figure, hey, may as well bring his quarry back so he can enjoy it, and so I go climbing through the rubble until I find this turian. And I don't figure out until I'm an inch from his face that he's still alive, and the poor sod opens his eyes and stares at me, and I said, "Now how the fuck are you still alive?" And this guy, he just stares at me and shrugs and says, "I honestly don't know." "

Kel snorted. Thie blinked. "Was he injured?"

"Oh, fuck yeah. Broke one leg, shattered his arm, and I'm pretty sure he was missing half of one of those horns on his crest." Raik grinned. "But he survived. Impressed the hell out of me, I thought he was maw meat. I was tempted to make him an honorary krogan, but that would've been more redundant than my nervous system."

Axilus twisted around again, gaping. "Wait a second, was the turian's name Kyeiros?"

Raik contemplated for a moment, then shrugged and nodded. "Yeah, something like that."

"That was my great-great-granddad."

A moment later, Raik snorted. "Wow, I shoulda seen that coming when I heard the name Madelivio. That's the thing about fifteen centuries. You start forgetting the most obvious things."

Kel sputtered. "You're fifteen hundred years old?!"

"Uh, yeah. Did I not mention that?"

"No, I'm pretty sure you didn't. Why didn't you?"

"Didn't think it'd be important." Raik shrugged. "Krogan. Blue over there looks about as old as I am, and he's a third my age." He paused, then added, "I think."

Crux just grinned. "You make me sound like a whelp barely out of diapers."

"To me, you are."

"And to me, you're an ancient, decrepit old man."

"I fought in the Rebellions, show me some respect, dammit."

"Nah."

The krogan stared at each other for a moment. Then Crux grinned and Raik huffed and the standoff broke.

Kel blinked slowly. "You fought during the Krogan Rebellions?"

Raik glanced back at him and shrugged again. "Yep. Don't ask me what it was like, I can't remember for shit."

"Why not?"

"Because I was about as old as you. Not actually. Krogan terms. Mid-fifties or so."

"You fought in one of the worst wars in krogan history and you don't remember it."

"Nope. Not important."

"Not important. Okay, I've heard it all." Kel buried his face in his hands, while Axilus just looked amused.

"So, uh, why didn't you try to kill me when you first saw me?" he asked, turning to raise a brow plate at Raik. "I mean, don't you blame us all for the genophage?"

"Nah. Krogan stupidity."

Thie blinked. "No hard feelings?"

"Nah. Except maybe for the salarians. Damn salarians and their genophage."

"You don't blame the turians. At all."

"No, that'd be like blaming the turians for the 314." Raik grinned. "Oh, wait."

Axilus twisted around again to give Raik a dark glare. "You watch it. My dad and granddad almost died in that, and my uncle actually did."

"Everyone loses someone sometime. 'sides, wasn't a personal attack, calm your ass down."

"I was eight!"

"And I was four the first time I got to see someone die." Raik just shrugged again. "... 'course, we might've caused it, but whatever. You wanna talk about a traumatic childhood, talk to any krogan you meet."

Siri squeaked. "You killed someone when you were _four?"_

"Nah. Kax did. She wasn't exactly careful. Neither was I, but that's not what we're talking about."

"Can we change the subject before someone _else_ dies?"

"Kax was amazing. Crazy as fuck. Beat up Fluffy the first time I brought 'im home. You ever seen a krogan get a maw in a chokehold and try to beat its brains in with her own skull? Incredible. That was true, by the way, I couldn't make this shit up if I tried. Not creative enough. Ask Gurdnau for that."

"No, seriously, I think Ax is about to explode."

"Eh, he'll live. He's a Madelivio."

"What does that have to do with anything?"

"The krogan have this thing about Madelivios. Have ever since Mads the First decided to take Fluffy for a joyride. And the turians have a joke about the Madelivios." Raik grinned. "How many bullets does it take to kill a Madelivio? Just guess."

"Uh... a whole clip?"

"Trick question. You can't kill a Madelivio, you'll just make him angry. You just have to hope you have enough bullets to keep him away from you 'til he dies of old age. Another one: how do you drop a Madelivio?"

"Uh..."

"You threaten to tell his mother. What do you call a group of Madelivios?"

"Is this really the time-"

"A murder of bad luck, and not for them. How do turians paint a target for an orbital strike?"

This time Axilus answered, "They put a Madelivio in a field and tell him to stand still," and turned around with a wide grin. "My uncle used to tell me those all the time. Drove my mom nuts. She blamed him for me falling out of the tree and breaking my leg for months."

"Can't say I can blame her. Those jokes are horrible." Thie shook his head. "How are you doing up there, Ax?"

"Pretty good, I think. The cockpit's roomier than the _Anchrivos."_ Axilus stretched out dramatically, splaying his limbs every which way to demonstrate. "See? Plenty of room to stretch. Dez would be so jealous right about now."

"Dez?"

"The pilot. You never met him, but he was cool. Taught me how to fly." He grinned, tapping a few buttons on the holographic dashboard. "Never thought insomnia would come in handy, but it let me learn how to fly, and I trust me flying way more than I do Red back there. Sorry," he added, flashing Kel an apologetic shrug.

Kel shrugged back. "It's fine. I'm not exactly the best at flying, anyway. Maybe you could tell. I, uh..." He hunched his shoulders, and Thie could tell his cheeks were flushed as he said, "I never actually learned to fly."

"Wait, really?" Axilus looked stunned, and so did Siri.

Thie sighed. "We didn't have time to get him into a flight sim. So we just loaded up all the flight VIs we could and hoped for the best."

"Why didn't you fly, then, Thie?"

"Kel's more coordinated than me. We probably would have ended up in a gravity well somewhere instead of the colony we landed on when the drive core decided to shit itself."

"Oh."

"Hopefully you're a bit better at flying than we are, since you've been trained and everything. Even if it wasn't professional."

"Yeah, I hope so." Now Axilus sounded worried, and Thie cursed his innate ability to make anyone and everyone question absolutely everything they did. Last thing they needed was a worried pilot. "Just wish me luck."

Then everything fell silent for a long couple minutes, and the krogan exchanged a glance before withdrawing back downstairs while the quarians scattered themselves throughout the main deck. Thie decided to begin tinkering with the galaxy map, hoping to knock the faint static out of the holograhic display, and Siri drifted over to help. Kel, meanwhile, situated himself in the cockpit as well, leaning on Axilus's chair and watching him work.

After a few minutes, Axilus shooed Kel away, and he drifted back to the other two, leaning against the wall. "Want my help?" he offered, though he and the others were perfectly aware that while he was a great mechanic, he wasn't exactly a good engineer, though he at least had better hand-eye coordination than Thie could boast. He just couldn't work with computers. "Maybe I could hold something?"

"I think we've got it." Thie pried up a loose panel and held aside a few wires so Siri could fit her hand in. "Looks like a frayed wire or two, nothing too big. We can have it fixed in minutes, soon as we find out where the problem is."

"Aha!" Siri jerked her hand out, scaring both Thie and Kel, and started sifting through her pockets for tools. "I found it, it's right down there," she said, pointing with her free hand, and Thie leaned in to look. "Frayed wire, just like you thought. I just need a minute to..." Her hands disappeared into the mess of wires again for a moment. Then something clicked and she jumped, then grinned as the hologram flickered, then steadied again, the static gone. "There! That was easy enough." Then she paused, tugged once, and smiled sheepishly. "Um... my hand is stuck."

Thie sighed. "Kel, help her get her hand free, please. My hands are busy."

"Sure, right." Kel ducked under Thie's arm and plunged his hand into the mess of wires as well, sifting around until Siri could pull her hand free. "Dunno how you got those knotted around your wrist. You seem to be a magnet for trouble, huh?" he teased with a smile, ducking back so Thie could drop the panel closed.

Siri flushed and began tucking her tools into her pockets again. "I guess so... Good thing you're around to keep me safe?"

Kel grinned and nodded, moving to stand up and offering Siri a hand, which she accepted after only a moment's hesitation. "I'll do my best to."

Thie glanced between the two of them, then rolled his eyes and stood. "Yeah, okay, I'm leaving before I get infected with whatever mushy disease you two have. You need me, I'll be in the cockpit."

"Have fun with your boyfriend!" Kel teasingly called as Thie walked away. Thie flinched and, from the cockpit, Axilus snorted. Then he turned to Siri and asked, "So, want to go check out the new ship with me?" to which Siri shyly agreed.

Thie waited for the two of them to evacuate the upper deck before sighing and leaning on Axilus's chair. "So is it as obvious as it seems, or am I turning romantic?"

"That she likes him?" Axilus flicked out a mandible in a wry grin. "Oh yeah, it's obvious. If she was a turian, the only thing that'd be more obvious is a couple fresh from sex, and only barely. Think we should let Kel in on it?"

"No, I think he's picking up on it. Just give them a little while." Thie sighed and moved to fall into the copilot's seat, wincing. His leg still had the ghost of an ache though it wasn't broken anymore, and standing on it too long only made it worse. It was better than the instant agony of before, though, so he couldn't really complain. At least he could move. "So. Feeling better?"

"A little." He shrugged. "I called my great-grandma Theris. Her mind's going, she's so old, but it's hard not to love her. It helped."

Thie shrugged too, slouching back in his seat. "Seeing friendly faces always does. Uh, so to speak."

Axilus cracked a smile, mandibles briefly fluttering in what Thie assumed to be amusement before his expression turned serious. He reached up to the holographic dashboard and tapped a few buttons. "Remember when I asked to be alone and everyone left for a few hours?" He waited for Thie's acknowledging nod before continuing, "Well, I did some digging out of curiosity, and I found out something interesting."

"What?" Thie raised an eyebrow, leaning in to try to catch a glimpse of the files Axilus had pulled up, but he minimized them too quickly for him to get a reading.

"Remember that time on the _Anchrivos,_ right after you woke up? How you mistook me for the turian councilor, even though the markings are wrong, I'm kinda bigger than he is, and my plates are slightly more reddish?"

"You mean while I was scared, sick, exhausted, disoriented, and, oh yeah, drugged the hell out of my mind?" Thie shook his head. This could only go somewhere weird. "Yeah, I remember that. Barely. What of it?"

Axilus flared his mandibles in a wide grin. "Turns out there's a reason we looked so much alike."

"You mean aside from my being delirious from fever and being drugged into a stupor?"

"Yeah, aside from that. A legitimate reason."

"Freak döppelganger incident? Time travel? Genetic clone?"

"No, no, and, sadly, no." Axilus looked like he was about to piss himself from excitement as he pulled the files back up, this time allowing Thie to lean over and, incredulously, scan the headlines.

"No fuckin' way."

"Oh fuckin' yeah." Axilus grinned. "We're related."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Before anyone ruffles their feathers, turian family relations are weird in this 'verse. It'll all be explained in the next chapter, I promise. Also, it was mostly an accident that Ax ended up related to Sparatus. Long story short, I should not be allowed to design turian markings and Becks/NoisyNoiverns should not be allowed to headcanon about turian markings. Strange things come out of it.


	16. Ah Yes, "Cultural Lessons"

"What do you mean, you're related to the councilor?"

Axilus snorted and shook his head. "Not as closely as it sounds. We're far enough away that I had no clue 'til I started pulling up census records from for-fuckin'-ever ago. Guess that explains the marking differences."

"You have access to those?" On second thought, why was he surprised? It was probably like what a crew manifest was for the quarians. Pretty public knowledge, especially for a culture that placed so much emphasis on family as the turians. He shook his head. "Scratch that. You mean that's what you've been doing up here, instead of flying?"

"Nah, I'm flying the ship too. But in this day and age, the ships mostly fly themselves. Minimal pilot input required. So I had some time to think and do a couple extranet searches. You'd be amazed what you can find with the right keywords." Axilus tapped a few keys and a new window opened, lines of names and faces scrolling by far too quickly for anything to register. "See? Complete archives."

"How did you sort through it all?" Thie had to admit, he was impressed. For someone with such a short attention span as Axilus, such a feat was... well, impressive.

"It's... not as cool as you probably think. I didn't go through it myself." The turian flicked out a mandible and shrugged. "I searched the last name 'Sparatus' and did some comparisons when I saw some familiar names. Turns out, we share some family members way back down the line. Well, not _way_ back, but not close. We're clan. Not family."

"... I don't... get it. The difference. I don't."

"Not surprising, everyone seems to think it's some big, complicated thing 'cept for turians." Axilus grinned. "C'mere, I'll explain."

Thie stared blankly at him for a moment.

Axilus blinked at him, then suddenly realized what he was staring at him for and shrugged sheepishly. "Oh, right. You're sitting down already- well, just listen, then." He turned back to the screen and started fiddling with the windows until a picture of the councilor appeared, accompanied by several lines of text. "Here. Councilor Ierian Sparatus."

"Ierian?"

"Old name. Very prestigious. Name of the first Primarch of Palaven, Ierian Candimius. You name a kid that, you're pretty much guaranteeing he'll go places. Also comes with a fifty-fifty chance of getting beat up, because it sounds very... salarian-ish. We'd eat those if they were dextro." He sighed longingly, and Thie had to take a moment to remind himself that turians were, in fact, obligate carnivores, calm down.

Axilus shook himself slightly, snapping out of his reverie, then nodded sharply. "Anyway. Ierian Sparatus, promoted eight years ago after the political blowback from 314 forced the last councilor to retire. He was pretty young, actually, only forty-nine. Usually we name our councilors while they're in their fifties or sixties."

"That young?"

"Yes. You're getting off-topic."

"You brought it up."

"In case you hadn't noticed, I have the attention span of an _incommovol."_

"A what?"

"Annoying Palavenian insect. Also what we call the volus when they're too busy talking themselves up to hear. Shut up and let me explain this, would you? You're getting me off-track." He huffed, mandibles fluttering in irritation. _"Anyway._ Councilor Ierian Sparatus, married, three kids, one older sister, born to Triadim and Meana Sparatus. Now check this out." He tapped a key, and the picture of the councilor became smaller, joined by pictures of several other turians in what Thie supposed was a genealogical map. Axilus scrolled to the side, and more pictures and names appeared, the map shrinking itself to fit everything accordingly. He squinted and twitched his head, apparently tracing the family lineage, then pointed to a steely gray turian woman. "There. Doctor Corinn Madelivio, born Corinn Sparatus. Married to General Octyrus Madelivio, father of Aephis Madelivio and grandfather of yours truly. That's family. Up there?" He moved back up and tapped a talon against the councilor's holographic face. "That's clan."

Thie blinked, then looked between Axilus and the screen. Then he huffed and shook his head. "That's not distant! You're, what, cousins?"

"First cousins, once removed. It's distant enough."

"Your dad is literally the councilor's cousin. That's not very distant, Axilus."

Axilus sighed patiently. "Look, it's like this. If the tree goes horizontal to accommodate, and there's a generation between, you're clan, not family. That makes it distant."

"That makes literally no sense at all, even for someone as nonsensical as you."

Axilus rolled his eyes. "I'll show you, then. Watch." He zoomed in on his side of the map and pointed a talon at the screen. "Here's me, yeah?" He traced over to Tollak next to him. "You go sideways, there's Tol. He's my brother, so he's family. But let's say he gets married. He's heteroromantic, it's possible. Girlfriend's kinda weird, but then, she's dating _Tollak."_ He snickered to himself, then continued, "Say he had a kid. Unlikely, because he's such a loser he couldn't get laid even if he was interested, but this is hypothetical. That kid would be a generation removed from me. Thus, they'd be clan. So, if we go back up..." He moved his claw back up to the gray turian lady. "There's no sideways lines between me and Grandma Corinn, so she's family. But you have to go sideways to get to her sister the councilor's mom, so she and all her descendants are clan."

"That... makes slightly more sense, but still makes no sense."

Axilus's sigh was a lot more impatient this time. "Look, turian clans are really complicated, okay? It's all based on your relations, and it's only gotten harder to keep track of since we started colonizing other planets. Then all the clans got really spread out, some families died out, some reached astronomical population levels, and _all_ of them like to argue. As in a _lot._ As in you only don't hear about clan leaders doing clan leader-y things because all the issues they deal with are turian-specific and are basically different clans having stupid arguments, and once clan leaders get involved, the entire situation is fucked and inter-species politicians pretty much just step back and hope they don't get caught in the crossfire."

Thie frowned. "That's nothing like how the Fleet works. Whenever there's a family-wide argument on the Fleet, the captain will step in to sort it out before it turns into a mess. It can't be good for turians to just let it go on like that. Doesn't it cause trouble? You know, conflict, death?"

"That's why we have the clan leaders. They're required to be the neutral party, so they can resolve disputes peacefully and get what their people want without resorting to bloodshed."

"But they wait too long to intervene. They should get involved as soon as it goes beyond two or three members of the family, instead of waiting for everyone to be involved."

Axilus huffed, fluttering his mandibles in irritation. "I don't know if you've noticed this or not, but turians are aggressive. Species of hunters."

"That doesn't change the facts." Thie crossed his arms. "Waiting that long is dangerous. On the Fleet, that can lead to mutiny."

"This isn't the Fleet! Look. _You_ are a quarian. _I_ am a turian. I know what I'm talking about." Axilus flared his mandibles out and huffed loudly when Thie tried to interrupt. "Listen. Clan leaders only get involved once it's clear we're not going to be able to work it out with a brawl. That's how it works. That's how it _has_ worked, ever since we evolved enough to start forming family groups. The arguing parties pick their best fighters and pit them against each other. Whoever wins, that family- tribe, back then, but those have mostly split up into singular families now- has the means to back up their claims, so they win the argument. If there's still a challenge, it escalates to a... cold war, I guess you'd call it. Back then, the clan leader was last involved and first into battle. Now, if you can't work it out, the clan leader is last involved, first to make peace. That's how you run a clan of aggressive carnivores!"

"You could solve it before it even got to violence if you'd just-"

"It doesn't _work_ like that!"

Thie scowled. "And how doesn't it? It works just fine for literally every other species in the galaxy- minus the krogan, maybe, but they're hardly an example, they don't even _have_ family units- so why the fuck can't it work for the turians?"

"We're a people rooted in history and tradition! Every regiment, every legion, every _fleet_ has a historian so we remember our roots! My mom used special tech so she could wear the traditional garb for her wedding- following tradition was literally more important than protecting her own health! You saw all the shit she does to keep her skin protected, she barely steps in front of a window without some sort of protection! And instead of bucking tradition, she found a way _around_ her condition so she could follow it! _We don't break tradition._ You have a problem with the guy down the street who looked at you the wrong way, you don't show your neck and make him _like_ you, you kick his ass and make him _fear_ you."

Thie just shook his head and folded his arms, leaning back. "Well, some things are worth breaking tradition over."

"You don't get it- _ugh._ Just drop it." Axilus clacked his mandibles against his jaw and shook his head, turning back to the screen with a low growl. "Look, you wanna see a shortcut, who's related to who? See the markings?"

"You mean the colony markings?"

Axilus gave him an incredulous look. _"Colony?_ Fuck no, who the fuck told you that bullshit?"

"Uh..." Thie blinked. "Human extranet sources. Look, turians don't exactly post all that shit online, I had to do some digging and that was all I could find."

"Humans have only known we exist for nine years. Don't listen to them about anything on the subject of non-human species, they know exactly bullshit." He rolled his eyes and muttered something about stupid mammals. "They're _clan_ markings, with minor differences depending on family. The families get shuffled around a lot because of marriages and shit, so all the clans have a couple distinguishing features in the markings to mark blood descent. I mean, you could _maybe_ call them colony markings, since most of our worlds have one dominant clan, so you could probably guess what colony someone's from based on their clan, but you still have to be careful. Where you're from is kind of a big deal with us. It's incredibly dishonorable to be barefaced, 'cause it means your clan doesn't want you. There've been turians who disgraced the clan so bad, they were held down while the clan leader forcibly removed their markings personally. Hurts like a bitch. Greatest dishonor a turian can suffer."

"So like exile?"

"Yeah, pretty much. Anyway, here." He opened a new window and typed furiously for a moment, pulling up several pictures of turians with widely differing markings. "These are all different families within Clan Sephulkim, my clan. See anything?"

"Um..." Thie squinted a bit, looking between the various pictures. "Yes. Turians. Many turians."

Axilus groaned and put his hands against his face, talons digging against his eyes for a brief moment before putting them back down. _"Aliens._ Look at the markings and tell me what similarities you see, smartass."

Thie rolled his eyes, then looked at the pictures again. "Well... There's that... the... the thing." He brought his hand up to his cheek and pulled it back towards the back of his head. "Here."

Axilus rolled his eyes. "Very descriptive. But yeah, that's one of them. Stripe on the zygomatic horn. Or the horn coming off the cheek plate, if you feel like sounding like an uneducated heathen."

"And what does that mean?"

"I just told you. This horn." He placed a talon on the white stripe beneath his eye and followed it back to the end of his fringe.

"No, I mean- what does- it-" Thie made a frustrated noise and gestured madly at Axilus's zygomatic stripe, then at the pictures still onscreen. "It represents- it- the-"

"Spit it out, Thie."

"What does it-" He flailed for a minute, then just gave up and pointed at the screen. "The clan, yes?"

"... yes, Thie, that's the clan."

"No! I mean, it- it- represents- the clan, right?" To Axilus, Thie looked like he was trying to somehow fling his own arms off, or maybe break his shoulders, with how enthusiastically he was motioning around. Probably just a quarian thing.

"Uh... yeah."

Thie threw his hands up and leaned back with a groan. "That's what I wanted to know. Thanks, asshole."

"Oh, we're not done yet."

He groaned loudly.

Axilus gave him a grin he swore was sadistic. "Oh, relax, there's only one other main identifier. See the mandibles?"

"You mean the ones right in front of me?"

"You're not even looking."

Thie moved his hand away from over his eyes to find Axilus' mandibles were, indeed, right in front of him. As was the rest of Axilus. He panicked for about a half a second, realized he could not, in fact, use his biotics to send Axilus through the window, realized what a bad idea doing so would be in the first place, briefly entertained the notion of headbutting him very hard, remembered that turian plates were hard enough to crack his visor, and instead just settled for attempting to inhale his mask and accidentally smacking Axilus when his hands came flying up in a panic. "Keelah, don't _do_ that!"

Axilus cackled, apparently completely unfazed by the sudden hit to the face, and sat back in the pilot's chair. "You weren't paying attention. Anyway. Look at the pictures again. See how everyone's mandibles have that sorta swooping stripe?"

Thie sat up and looked over the pictures again, then glanced back at Axilus. "That another one?"

Axilus bobbed his head. "The mandible swoop and the zygomatic stripe denote Clan Sephulkim."

"What if you only have one?"

"What?"

"There's two markings there. What if you only have one of them?"

Axilus paused, mandibles turning in small circles, then shrugged. "Handful of centuries ago, the clan got so big, it split up. There were three tribes, and they all became their own clans. One tribe had both, and they became Clan Sephulkim. The tribe with just the stripe became Parthades, and the one with just the swoop became Rilerian. But most clans are easier to tell apart than those three. Like, didja see how my mom didn't have either one?"

When Thie nodded slowly, Axilus continued, "She's from Tekaetrus. Our best minds. Engineers and scientists, the whole lot of them. They're mostly clustered on Palaven's southern continent- hell, they practically own the whole damn thing- but there's at least one Tekaetrus family on every colony. They're the backbone of the turian, and thus the entire dextro, agricultural industry. Got a hand in basically everything that requires science and math."

"Is that why your mom and grandparents kept complaining about how stupid we all are?"

"Exactly." Axilus chuckled. "Unofficial clan motto is 'I'm surrounded by idiots.' That's what happens when you get a clan full of brainiacs. Anyway, you can usually tell Tekaetrus from the green markings, but there's a portion of families with other colors. No white, weirdly enough. But they still follow the other rule. Very thin lines. Tekaetrus loves thin lines for their markings, for whatever reason. Literally every other clan uses these big, thick lines, but Tekaetrus uses thin, artsy-fartsy ones."

"... Was there a point to telling me that?"

"Uh... no. Sorry. Went off on a tangent."

"You do that a lot."

"Yeah, sorry." Axilus sheepishly fluttered his mandibles. "But, yeah. Now, normally turians will exchange markings once they're married, maybe names, just like most other cultures. But where it gets weird is that we do it based on meritocratic standing."

"Oh." Thie stared quietly at the rows of unfamiliar turian faces still covering the dashboard for a moment. "Well, I guess that makes sense for a meritocracy."

"Yep. So, basically, it doesn't matter who marries who, the only turians who exchange names are the ones belonging to the clan with less political standing than the other, and even then, it's not obligatory. It's a respect thing. If they're of the same clan, it goes down to family, then to individual status. Doesn't usually get to that, though. Mom didn't take Dad's markings or name when they got married because the clans were currently of equal standing. Also because Mom didn't want the Madelivio reputation of having a stupid amount of bad luck and no brain."

Thie chuckled, then was quiet for a moment. Then he replied, "Quarians are like that, too. Just less meritocratic."

"Really?" Axilus gave Thie a surprised flutter of his mandibles, clearing away the rows of faces and pulling back up his flight programs. "How's that?"

Thie shrugged. "We have clans, too. Sort of. Bloodlines, reputations. Some of us, anyway. Well, most, really. The Xens are known for their intelligence, the Todors for their tactical mind, and the Hiims for their diplomatic ability. The Zorahs are the leaders, and the Reegars are the marines. The Raaluns tend to be devious con artists and smugglers, but they're damn good at debating and negotiating because of it. They're trends, but they're well-respected and usually pretty reliable. Whatever clan name you're born to dictates what first impression you'll be giving everyone for the rest of your life." He paused, then quietly added, "The Haasns are known for their engineering prowess. Guess that makes me a disappointment, I'm not exactly the best engineer I know."

Axilus wisely chose to let that statement drop like an over-capacity heat sink and sat back. "So, you marry and take names based on what clan you want to be part of?"

"Basically. And you don't have to take the name, and your kids can get whichever name has the reputation you'd rather for them, it's all just preference." He chuckled. "A lot of us marry for love, but every now and then you get someone trying to marry in for the name and the reputation that comes with it. A lot of wannabe Zorahs doing that recently. Do turians do that?"

"Marry for the name?"

"Yeah."

"Oh yeah. Or to get out of a reputation." Axilus grinned. "Do you know how many Madelivios have deliberately married their way out of the Madelivio name? It's hilarious." Then he cocked his head. "But I've never heard of someone trying to marry into one name in particular. So what's with the quarians?"

"We got a new admiral two years back. Rael'Zorah vas Rayya." Thie shrugged. "Some big-shot upstart who thinks he can find us a way back to the homeworld. He's smart, but I don't know how successful he'll be. But apparently that's just my opinion, because the day after he was appointed, the number of Zorahs on the registry blew up like a faulty power coupling."

"Maybe they just wanted to be related in name to the new admiral. You see it happen a lot when a new Primarch is selected."

"Maybe. But that didn't happen when the great Admiral Tuzh joined the Board. So I figure it must be because he's in his thirties instead of his sixties. Terrible flirting technique, if you ask me."

"Is he married?"

"Yep, with a four-year-old daughter. Which just makes it even funnier."

Axilus grinned and shook his head. "Love to see the looks on their faces when they find out about that, huh?" When Thie didn't respond, he tapped around on the dash for a moment, then glanced at him and asked, "So, now I've told you all about my family. But I still don't know anything about yours."

Thie hesitated. "What do you want to know?"

"I dunno. What they're like, I guess. You don't have to go off an tangent about them like I do." Axilus shrugged. "I'd just like to hear about them. Talking about family is relaxing."

"Maybe for you."

The smile instantly faded from Axilus's face. "Oh boy. That's a 'this is a bad story' phrase. Is it a bad story?"

When Thie didn't reply, he winced. He'd evidently forgotten how insensitive he could be when he got excited. "Okay, sorry. Forget I asked."

"No, it's fine." Thie shook his head slowly, closing his eyes. "I just... well, I haven't thought about them for a while. Lots of... bad memories."

"... do you wanna talk about it?"

"I don't know." He gave a half-hearted shrug. "We were in a good mood. Hate to ruin it by bringing up my asshole dad."

"Ah." Axilus nodded sagely. "That explains every-"

"No, no it doesn't."

He fell silent, tapping awkwardly at the controls for a moment. Then he ducked his head. "Sorry. Shouldn't have brought it up in the first place."

"It's fine. You didn't know."

The cockpit fell silent, and stayed that way for several long, tense moments before Thie broke the silence with, "My mom died when I was born." Axilus winced, but didn't interrupt. "Too much stress on her system from my biotics, and she'd never been the strongest, physically, anyway. My dad, Tol'Haasn, he didn't... take it very well."

"You said something about red sand?" Thie hadn't known he could sound so gentle, and he was grateful for it. Remembering was difficult.

He took a deep breath and nodded. "My dad ran imports. A little bit of fiddling with the numbers and he started paying a smuggler under the table to bring in red sand. Started small, then got so messed up he pretty much lived in the medical wing." He shrugged. "Not that I minded. He liked to take his anger out on me. Yelled, mostly. My brother went off on his Pilgrimage three years early because of it, and joined the marines as soon as he got back. I can't really blame him."

Axilus didn't speak for a long moment. Then he quietly asked, "Did your father blame you?"

Thie didn't answer.

"... you blame yourself."

"It's hard not to when you've grown up being told that it was your fault."

"Don't. There was nothing you could do."

"I know. That's the worst part." He shrugged. "But it's not all bad. I have a step-mother. She married my father two years ago, started turning him around. He's doing a lot better because of her. Still blames me, but..."

Axilus opened his mouth to respond, and at that moment, Siri and Kel chose the worst possible time to spontaneously appear in the cockpit, and Kel happily chirped, "How long 'til we get to the Citadel?"

Axilus hit his head on the roof.

Once Thie had recovered from his sudden heart failure, he turned to give Kel a death glare. "Couldn't you have picked a better time to scare me half to death? I was having a soul-rending conversation about my parents with Axilus."

Kel just smiled. "I know. But you were getting a little too depressed, so I figured we'd lighten the mood."

"By scaring the piss out of your pilot?!" Axilus had finally extracted his talons from the ceiling and descended back into his seat, positively fuming. "I could have crashed!"

"Into what, the empty void of space?"

"Ha-fuckin'-ha, smartass. One more comment like that and you'll get to admire that empty void from the lovely view of the outside of the airlock."

Thie knew Kel stuck his tongue out at Axilus, and rolled his eyes. "Seriously, though, how close are we? We've been flying for hours!"

"FTL takes a long time, Kel-" Thie grumbled, but Axilus cut him off by groaning loudly.

"Everyone always acts like travelling by FTL is soooo quick! Like it should take ten minutes instead of four hours!" Axilus flared his mandibles. "No, I don't care what the vids tell you, the vids lie, it takes fuckin' hours, and we're not even halfway there!" He ignored the sudden burst of _"Whooooah, we're halfway there, WHOOOOOOOOAAAH, LIIIIVING ON A PRAAAYER"_ from Crux somewhere downstairs, the reference of which sailed over his head and into the depths of the galactic core, and continued, "And don't question me, I'm the fuckin' pilot. Go sit down and be ignorant somewhere else, would you?" Then he shook his head, mumbled, "Where does the krogan even _get_ those," and returned to stabbing angrily at the holographic dashboard, grumbling.

Thie sighed and shook his head. "Kel, you and Siri should probably just go get some rest."

Kel blinked, nodding slowly. "Yeah... seems that way." He paused. "But now I'm kind of afraid that Crux is going to come in while I'm sleeping and start quoting that human playwright at me for kicks again. Or that Raik is going to punch him through the wall or something."

"Just go to bed. I'll tell Raik to keep him away from you."

"And Siri. He scared the hell out of Siri that last time. The joke he made about it didn't help."

"I don't want to know."

"No, you don't. It was kind of mean. He apologized, but still." Kel slung an arm around Siri's shoulders, and Thie couldn't help but notice that she didn't flinch like she did with everyone else. Interesting. "C'mon, let's go find someplace quiet to catch some shut-eye." He nodded to Thie. "You should, too, Thie. I get the feeling this is the- what's that human phrase... the lull before the hurricane? Get some rest while you still can."

Thie nodded. "I know. I will. Go to sleep, Kel."

Kel mockingly saluted, and Thie just knew he was wearing a big, goofy smile beneath his mask as he did so. "Right away, Captain. Night!" And then, before anyone could say a word, he grabbed Siri by the wrist and dragged her off down the stairs.

Axilus raised a brow plate at Thie, cocking his mandibles. "Captain, huh?"

"Shut it, Madelivio." Thie shook his head and leaned back. "Or should I just call you 'Pilot' from now on?"

"Pilot is good." Axilus grinned. "Sounds official. Not quite as good as flight lieutenant, though."

"You're not military anymore, you dumbass. You're not even a pilot, you're an idiot who's too stupid to even crash."

"Yeah, yeah. Still, I'd kill to be a flight lieutenant. Talk about the most kickass name ever." He sighed dreamily. "Flight Lieutenant Axilus Madelivio. Nice ring to it."

"Keep dreaming."

"I will, thanks." He grinned again, then glanced over at Thie, smile fading. "You gonna be all right?"

"Yeah..." Thie sighed and nodded slowly. "I'll be fine. A bit better now that we're off Palaven, especially. I'm just tired."

"There's been a lot going on lately. Take your own advice, get some sleep. I won't crash." He cracked a smile. "I promise."

Thie glanced back at him, watched him for a minute. Then he slowly nodded. "All right. But wake me up if anything happens. And before we dock, too. I want to keep an eye on you while you're going through docking, make sure you don't do anything stupid that gets our ship impounded."

"Hey, give me some credit, Thie!"

He shook his head, fighting a smile. "You heard me. Wake me up."

Axilus feigned hurt, then smiled and nodded. "You got it. Ten minutes before we dock, promise." He flicked out a mandible. "Or earlier if I do something catastrophically idiotic, like forget to check the fuel injectors before I jump to make sure they're not going to explode something."

"That's not how it-"

"Shut up, I don't engines. My mom does that. Well, she does drive cores, actually, but she worked the engine room on the _Villentos_ during mandatory, so it counts. Go to sleep. Don't make me hack into your suit and knock you out with sedatives like that doctor did. Yes, my mom totally told me about that. It was fuckin' hilarious."

Thie stuck his tongue out at him, because even if he couldn't see it, it was still satisfying. "Asshole. Touch my suit and I'll break your crest."

"You're a twig, you can't do that."

"Yeah? Look at your mom, she doesn't look like she can beat up two krogan, but she did, didn't she?"

"... point. Okay, I won't touch your suit." He then poked Thie in the arm and grinned. "Oops."

Thie rolled his eyes. "You know what I mean, you dick."

"Aw, what? No exotic quarian insults? Just boring old human ones?"

_"Nu'shga shodaha, shesh'tet."_

"... that sounds terrible. What the fuck did you just call me?"

"I'm not telling you." Thie smirked and curled up in the copolit's chair, dimming his visor as Axilus sputtered and whined beside him.

It had been difficult for him to sleep on Palaven. After spending so long curled up in makeshift huts aboard ships drifting weightlessly in space, trying to adjust to having a soft bed and warm blanket with natural gravity anchoring him to the ground just... didn't go so well. And the silence didn't help. He'd awakened in a panic more than once when he hadn't heard the familiar rumble of the drive core, the faint hum of the CO2 scrubbers, the groaning and creaking of the ship's skin around him as he drifted through space, and forgotten that he was in an apartment on Palaven. It had been a bit easier at the hospital, though he wasn't sure if it had been the ambient noise or the sedatives that had been the fault for that, but not much.

But being back in space put him at ease for the first time in months, and he closed his eyes and relaxed, easily slipping into restful sleep as the ship quietly bustled on around him, adrift among the stars. And for once, everything was peaceful.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The next installment of the series will be posted next week, so keep an eye out! Thanks for sticking around with these losers!


End file.
